Search Engineering Intern – Information Retrieval, Machine Learning

Job Description

Machine Learning Engineer Intern (Data-Search-TikTok Recommendation Team) – 2026 Summer (BS/MS) | TikTok

The Tone:
This is a 12-week summer internship at TikTok, located in Los Angeles County, CA. TikTok builds and owns a global short-form mobile video platform, aiming to inspire creativity and bring joy, with global headquarters in Los Angeles and Singapore. This role contributes to the Search Engineering Team, which is responsible for building and owning TikTok’s search engine to provide the best user experience for its users. Interns will gain industry exposure and hands-on experience, utilizing their knowledge in real-world scenarios to improve the search core algorithm through modern machine learning methods.

The TL;DR
• Role: Internship
• Type: Full-time
• Location: Los Angeles County, CA
• Pay: $42.75 hourly
• Team: Search Engineering Team
• Mission: Improve TikTok’s search core algorithm by combining information retrieval with modern machine learning, NLP, CV, and recommender systems to enhance relevance and personalization.
• Technical Domains: NLP, Ranking, Ads, search engine, recommender system, distributed system, machine learning, information retrieval

What You’ll Actually Do
• Algorithm Improvement: Participate in the general improvement of the search core algorithm.
• Content Understanding: Apply cutting-edge NLP and CV technology and leverage LLM to match relevant videos for search queries, continuously improving search relevance.
• User Behavior Modeling: Solve recommendation problems within search to increase personalization and enhance user understanding.
• Video Understanding: Utilize NLP, CV, and LLM for better video understanding from both video content and social network perspectives, improving the authority, credibility, and usefulness of search results.

The Must-Haves
• Background: Currently pursuing a Bachelor’s or Master’s in Software Development, Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or a related technical discipline.
• Experience: Experience in one or more of the following areas: Natural Language Processing (NLP), Ranking, Ads, search engine development, recommender systems, distributed systems, or machine learning.
• Skills: Proficient coding skills, strong algorithm & data structure basis, effective communication, and teamwork skills.
• Bonus: Demonstrated software engineering experience from previous internships, work experience, coding competitions, or publications; high levels of creativity and quick problem-solving capabilities.