Staff Machine Learning Engineer, Search Ranking

Responsibilities

• Lead the design and development of machine learning models for Search ranking, including relevance, personalization, and engagement optimization
• Own major ranking initiatives from problem definition through experimentation, launch, and iteration
• Develop ranking models using techniques such as learning-to-rank, deep retrieval, neural ranking, and large-scale feature engineering
• Build systems that balance multiple objectives including relevance, user satisfaction, diversity, fairness, and latency
• Partner with product managers and data scientists to define success metrics and the long-term ranking roadmap
• Provide technical leadership across teams, influence architecture decisions, and mentor engineers

Requirements

• Bachelor's Degree in a technical field (Computer Science or equivalent)
• 8+ years of post-Bachelor’s machine learning experience
• Proven experience developing ML models for relevance ranking, personalization, or intent understanding
• Proficiency in Python, C++, Java, or Scala
• Experience with large-scale data processing and ML infrastructure (Spark, Flink, or Beam)
• Experience with deep learning frameworks such as TensorFlow, PyTorch, or JAX

Preferred Qualifications

• Advanced degree (Master's or PhD) in Computer Science, Machine Learning, or a related field
• Direct experience building Search ranking systems, including query understanding and retrieval
• Experience with LLMs, foundation models, or retrieval-augmented generation (RAG)
• Experience with learning-to-rank methods like LambdaMART or transformer-based rankers
• Track record of advancing the state of the art in search, recommendations, or applied ML

About the Company

Snap Inc. is a technology company that believes the camera presents the greatest opportunity to improve the way people live and communicate. Our core products include Snapchat, Lens Studio, and Spectacles. We are committed to empowering people to express themselves, live in the moment, and have fun together through technically sophisticated products.