Principal Software Engineer, Search Infra, Elasticsearch

Elastic

Confirmed live today Low trust

Remote

Quick summary

Work type: Remote
Location: Remote
Posted: 3 days ago
Freshness: Confirmed live today

Market check

Salary context

How this pay compares to similar roles

Similar $218k

$138k most similar roles pay here $289k

This listing doesn't post a salary. Most similar roles pay $193,825–$241,750.

Based on 240 similar postings.

Employer

About Elastic

Elastic is the company behind Elasticsearch and the Elastic Stack (Elasticsearch, Kibana, Beats, and Logstash). It sells search, observability, and security products built on that search engine, primarily through its Elastic Cloud managed service.

Elastic currently has 272 open roles on FindRole.

Listed pay typically runs $133,100–$210,600 across 93 roles with salary data.

Most-posted roles

View all roles at Elastic

At a glance

TL;DR · Principal Software Engineer, Search Infra, Elasticsearch

Role Posting Log in to save

Principal Software Engineer - Search Infra - Elasticsearch joins the Search Infra team to provide technical vision and direction for core search infrastructure, including indexing, retrieval, and relevance. This role involves defining, leading, and contributing to the evolution of search capabilities while researching advances in data structures and retrieval algorithms. The engineer will collaborate with partners and product teams to shape the long-term roadmap for Elasticsearch’s query execution and relevance layers. Key requirements include expertise in distributed systems, core Java, advanced data structures, concurrency constructs, and experience with technologies like Lucene, Solr, or Elasticsearch. The role focuses on solving complex problems in search infrastructure and information retrieval by building high-performance software systems. Candidates must be able to lead technical projects autonomously while mentoring other engineers across a globally-distributed team to improve the underlying foundations of the platform.

What does a Software Engineer earn in Remote?

Median $202482 from 350 postings across 56 companies.

See salary data

Skills

Elasticsearch Lucene Java Solr Distributed Systems Data Structures Algorithms Open Source GitHub Source Control Search Infrastructure Information Retrieval Query Execution Indexing Concurrency

What you'll do

Define, lead, and contribute to the evolution of core search and indexing capabilities.
Research advances in search infrastructure, data structures, and retrieval algorithms.
Provide technical vision and direction for Elasticsearch’s core search infrastructure.
Develop an innovative roadmap for indexing, query execution, and relevance layers.
Act as a subject matter expert for specific domains within the search infrastructure.
Mentor expert engineers by providing both technical and professional guidance.
Manage projects from concept to completion, including technical design and component development.
Ensure all code contributions comply with secure software development frameworks and data protection policies.

What we're looking for

Experience leading technical projects in search infrastructure and distributed systems.
Experience mentoring expert engineers with technical and professional guidance.
Experience defining long-term technical vision for core search or retrieval systems across teams.
Hands-on experience with search and indexing technologies such as Elasticsearch, Lucene, or Solr.
Proficiency in core Java, advanced data structures, concurrency constructs, and modern language features like lambdas.
Ability to work autonomously from concept to completion including technical design and collaboration.
Experience with large-scale data systems or distributed storage engines.
Excellent verbal and written communication skills for collaborating across distributed teams.
Experience building with Elasticsearch and understanding search theory (preferred).
Experience with open source projects and familiar with various source control workflows and CI (preferred).

Save