Principal Research Software Engineer | Microsoft Careers

Microsoft

Quick summary

Work type: On-site
Location: WA
Salary: $139,900–$274,800 / yr
Posted: 50 days ago
Closes: Oct 11, 2026

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Competitive pay

How this pay compares to similar roles

Similar $196k

This role $207k

$124k most similar roles pay here $291k

This role pays more than 57% of similar roles. Most pay $177,250–$213,750 — the shaded band above. At the midpoint, this role pays about $207k versus about $196k for comparable roles.

Based on 240 similar postings.

Employer

About Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation is a global technology leader producing software, hardware, and cloud services including Windows, Office 365, Azure cloud platform, Xbox gaming, and Surface devices. Industry: Software & Cloud Computing

Microsoft currently has 571 open roles on FindRole.

Listed pay typically runs $119,800–$234,700 across 522 roles with salary data.

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TL;DR · Principal Research Software Engineer | Microsoft Careers

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Microsoft Research Americas Engineering is seeking a Principal Research Software Engineer to join their AI Agentic Core Team as an individual contributor. This role involves providing technical leadership and direct contributions by designing, developing, and shipping systems that transition MSR concepts into production-quality tools and services. Day-to-day responsibilities include building robust solutions across product experiences, APIs, data pipelines, model integration layers, and cloud infrastructure, while collaborating with researchers and product teams to align engineering efforts with research priorities. The ideal candidate will have deep expertise in coding languages like Python, Rust, C++, and experience applying AI or ML to real systems, along with familiarity with agentic AI frameworks, prompt engineering, and modern developer tooling. This role is well-suited for engineers who enjoy working across layers from product experiences to cloud infrastructure and are excited about advancing the research-to-product pipeline using cutting-edge AI technologies.

Skills

Python Rust C++ Azure AI ML agentic AI frameworks prompt engineering retrieval-augmented generation evaluation frameworks model fine-tuning observability APIs cloud systems CI/CD

What you'll do

Design and develop production-quality software systems from MSR concepts through scalable deployment.
Build robust solutions integrating product experiences, APIs, data pipelines, and cloud infrastructure.
Mentor engineers and guide architecture decisions to uphold best practices for code quality and security.
Define AI-driven processes using LLMs and modern developer tooling to accelerate research-to-product pipeline.
Develop agentic AI frameworks and integrate them into engineering workflows for complex task coordination.

What we're looking for

6+ years of technical engineering experience in coding languages like Python, Rust, C++, C#, C, Java, JavaScript
Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science or related field required; advanced degree preferred with additional years of experience
Experience applying AI/ML to real systems and products, including model training, adaptation, evaluation, optimization, and deployment
Familiarity with agentic AI frameworks, prompt engineering, retrieval-augmented generation, evaluation frameworks, and model fine-tuning
Proven ability to design, build, and ship software systems across various layers from prototypes to production
Technical leadership experience in cross-functional teams, defining direction, mentoring engineers, and driving complex projects

Principal Software Engineer | Microsoft Careers

Microsoft

Redmond, WA 43 days ago $139,900–$274,800

C# .NET OAuth2 OIDC Distributed Systems High-Performance Runtime Engines Policy/Rules Engines Identity Platforms ESTS Messaging Protocols Zero Trust Principles CI/CD Terraform Azure Kubernetes Prometheus Grafana

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