Principal Software Engineer

Microsoft

Confirmed live yesterday High trust

Quick summary

Work type: On-site
Location: Redmond, WA
Salary: $142,800–$274,800 / yr
Posted: 36 days ago
Freshness: Confirmed live yesterday
Closes: Feb 1, 2027
Nearby: 99+ roles within 25 mi

Market check

Salary context

Above market

How this pay compares to similar roles

Similar $200k

This role $209k

$127k most similar roles pay here $291k

This role pays more than 66% of similar roles. Most pay $174,600–$225,000 — the shaded band above. At the midpoint, this role pays about $209k versus about $200k 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 598 open roles on FindRole.

Listed pay typically runs $119,800–$234,700 across 586 roles with salary data.

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At a glance

TL;DR · Principal Software Engineer

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Principal Software Engineer joins the Azure Storage Control Plane Engineering team to build foundational infrastructure for managing data at global scale. This role involves designing and evolving control plane and management plane services that enable AI-scale workloads to provision, manage, and access storage resources with high performance and reliability. The engineer will drive innovations in distributed systems, resource orchestration, and intelligent automation while integrating AI engineering tools, agentic workflows, and code-generation technologies into the development lifecycle. Key responsibilities include shaping long-term architecture for training and inference workloads, serving as a designated responsible individual for critical components, and solving complex problems in scalability and availability. Required skills include proficiency in C#, C++, or Java, along with expertise in distributed systems, cloud infrastructure, and AI-powered engineering practices to support the storage foundation behind advanced AI models.

What does a Software Engineer earn in Washington?

Median $202800 from 326 postings across 28 companies.

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Skills

Azure Distributed Systems C# C++ Java Cloud Infrastructure Data Lake Object Storage LLM AI Engineering Agentic Workflows Scalability

What you'll do

Architect and deliver scalable control plane and management plane services for AI-scale storage workloads.
Drive innovations in distributed systems and resource orchestration to eliminate performance bottlenecks at scale.
Implement AI-assisted software development practices including automated code generation, testing, and debugging.
Integrate intelligent agents to automate engineering, deployment, and operational workflows across Azure Storage.
Define the long-term architecture and technical roadmap for storage infrastructure supporting AI training and inference.
Serve as a Designated Responsible Individual (DRI) for critical service components to ensure system health and reliability.

What we're looking for

Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science, Engineering, AI, Machine Learning, or a related technical field.
6+ years of technical engineering experience with coding in languages such as C#, C++, or Java.
Ability to pass the Microsoft Cloud Background Check and other required security screenings.
7+ years of experience designing and operating hyperscale cloud platforms, storage services, or distributed systems.
Experience building distributed storage systems, databases, or infrastructure services at scale.
Expertise in AI-enabled software engineering, including agentic workflows and LLM-powered coding assistants.
Proven track record of operating highly available cloud services with stringent reliability requirements.
Demonstrated technical leadership in driving architecture, strategy, and execution for large-scale distributed systems.

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