AI/ML Performance Engineering Intern, Speech

Job Description

Software Engineer Intern (AI Model Optimization) – 2026 Summer (BS/MS) | TikTok

The Tone:
This is a full-time internship at TikTok, located in Los Angeles, CA. TikTok is a global leader in short-form mobile video, dedicated to inspiring creativity and bringing joy to its users. This role is crucial for enhancing the efficiency and performance of the company’s large-scale AI models, directly impacting the user experience across all TikTok products. The intern’s contributions will help integrate cutting-edge speech and audio technologies into the platform, ensuring a seamless and engaging experience for a global user base.

The TL;DR
• Role: Internship
• Type: Full-time
• Location: In-person, Los Angeles, CA
• Pay: $42.75 hourly
• Team: Speech team
• Mission: Optimize AI model performance and efficiency for training, inference, and deployment to enhance user experience across TikTok products.
• Tech Stack: Python, PyTorch, TensorFlow, JAX

What You’ll Actually Do
• Improve: Work on enhancing the performance and efficiency of large-scale AI models across training, inference, and deployment.
• Optimize: Support research and engineering efforts to optimize deep learning models for speed, memory, and scalability.
• Benchmark: Contribute to benchmarking and profiling tools to identify performance bottlenecks.
• Integrate: Collaborate with engineers to integrate optimized models into production pipelines.

The Must-Haves
• Background: Currently pursuing a Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science or a closely related technical field. Candidates must be able to commit to a 12-week full-time work period during Fall 2026.
• Experience: Candidates should possess familiarity with prominent deep learning frameworks such as PyTorch, TensorFlow, or JAX. Knowledge of fundamental machine learning concepts and algorithms is also required.
• Skills: Strong programming proficiency in Python is essential for this role.
• Bonus: Prior experience with the full lifecycle of AI model training, inference, and deployment is a plus. Familiarity with GPU programming environments like CUDA or Triton, or similar technologies, would be beneficial. Strong problem-solving skills and a proactive eagerness to learn are highly valued.