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# Software Development Engineer, Amazon Java Runtime

- **Company:** Amazon.com, Inc.
- **Location:** Seattle, WA, United States
- **Experience:** Expert
- **Salary:** $168,100.0 - $227,400.0
- **Contract:** Internship / Graduate position
- **Skills:** Java (Programming Language), Code Generation, Code Review, Computer Programming, Software Design Patterns, Microprocessors, Java Development Kit, Java Virtual Machine (JVM), Software Engineering, Backend, Information Technology, Build Process, Software Coding, Software Version Control, Programming Languages
- **Published:** September 25, 2026
- **Apply:** https://dejobs.org/x/x/4D269108123B440C9B11F9B1AEC1AB52/job/

## About the Role

* 5+ years of non-internship professional software development experience
 * 5+ years of programming with at least one software programming language experience
 * 5+ years of leading design or architecture (design patterns, reliability and scaling) of new and existing systems experience
 * Experience as a mentor, tech lead or leading an engineering team, * 5+ years of full software development life cycle, including coding standards, code reviews, source control management, build processes, testing, and operations experience
 * Bachelor's degree in computer science or equivalent
 * Knowledge of ARM CPUs
 * Experience contributing to OpenJDK, the HotSpot JVM, or another production language runtime.
 * Depth in one or more GC algorithms (G1, ZGC, Shenandoah, or generational collectors) and their performance trade-offs.
 * Compiler backend or optimization experience (instruction selection, code generation, escape analysis, inlining, or similar).
 * A track record of upstream open-source contributions or published performance work.

## Description

1. Analyze production JVM workloads to identify compiler, GC, and runtime bottlenecks, and translate findings into concrete optimizations.
 2. Design, implement, and benchmark improvements to JIT compilation, garbage collection, and core runtime subsystems.
 3. Contribute changes upstream to OpenJDK and to Amazon Corretto, working through code review and community processes.
 4. Tune runtime behavior for performance and efficiency across x86 and Graviton (AArch64) architectures.
 5. Build and improve profiling, observability, and auto-tuning tooling so runtime expertise scales across the fleet rather than through manual, per-service consultation.
 6. Validate performance and reliability of changes against real workloads before broad rollout.
 7. Partner with service teams to drive adoption of runtime improvements and newer JDK versions.