Machine Learning Engineer Intern – Commerce Ads

Job Description

Machine Learning Engineer Intern (Commerce Ads) – 2026 Summer (BS/MS) | TikTok

The Tone:
This is an internship at TikTok, a global company recognized as the leading destination for short-form mobile video, with headquarters in Los Angeles and Singapore, and offices worldwide. The Commerce Ads team is dedicated to blending advertiser focus with technical expertise, and this role is pivotal in enhancing commerce advertisements. The mission is to establish TikTok as an essential growth engine for businesses of all sizes and a premier destination for consumers to discover and buy products, content, and services. As an intern, you will contribute significantly to driving TikTok’s ad revenue and developing the next-generation web ad solutions for the platform, gaining valuable industry exposure and hands-on experience.

The TL;DR
• Role: Internship
• Type: Full-time
• Location: Not explicitly stated
• Pay: $45–$60 hourly
• Team: TikTok Commerce Ads team
• Mission: Enhance commerce ads on TikTok to drive business growth and establish the platform as a top destination for product discovery and purchase.
• Tech Stack: Go, C/C++, Python, Linux, TensorFlow, PyTorch, MXNet, Spark

What You’ll Actually Do
• Build Systems: Construct highly scalable machine learning systems and state-of-the-art models to improve ads ranking quality and optimize advertisers’ marketing strategies.
• Improve Models: Explore, develop, and experiment with new features to enhance model accuracy for predictions like click-through rate and conversion rate.
• Optimize Relevance: Understand ads platform objectives to leverage modern machine learning for improving the relevance, quality, and quantity of ads delivered to users.
• Collaborate on Experiences: Work with Product Managers, Designers, and other teams to explore and develop the next generation of shopping experiences on TikTok.

The Must-Haves
• Background: Currently pursuing an Undergraduate or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or a related technical discipline.
• Experience: Must be able to commit to a 12-week full-time work period during Summer 2026, with start dates including May 11th, May 18th, May 26th, June 8th, or June 22nd. Familiarity with the Linux development environment is required.
• Skills: Solid programming skills in languages such as Go, C/C++, or Python, including familiarity with basic data structures and algorithms. Candidates should possess good analytical thinking capability and essential knowledge and skills in statistics. A strong theoretical grounding in machine and deep learning concepts and techniques (e.g., CNN/RNN/LSTM) is necessary, along with familiarity with the architecture and implementation mechanisms of at least one mainstream machine learning programming framework (e.g., TensorFlow/PyTorch/MXNet).
• Bonus: A good understanding of one of the following domains: ads bidding & auction, ads quality control, and online advertising systems, including terms like CPC/CPM, CTR/CVR, Ranking/Targeting, Conversion/Budget, Campaign/Creative, Demand/Inventory, DSP/RTB. Experience in resource management and task scheduling with large-scale distributed software (such as Spark and TensorFlow), or relevant work/research experiences in search and recommendation.