← All roles

Principal Software Engineer - Search Infra - Elasticsearch

Elastic· Platform - Elasticsearch
Apply on company site
Hybrid (Remote/global)$0full-timePosted 4w ago

About the role

Principal Software Engineer responsible for defining, directing, and building the next generation of Elasticsearch core search infrastructure, including indexing, retrieval, and relevance, with deep expertise in search internals and cross-team collaboration.

Responsibilities

  • Define, lead, and contribute to the evolution of core search and indexing capabilities for Elasticsearch.
  • Research advances in search infrastructure, data structures, and retrieval algorithms to build efficient foundations for users.
  • Collaborate with partners and product teams to shape long-term technical vision for search at Elastic.
  • Drive an innovative roadmap for Elasticsearch’s indexing, query execution, and relevance layers.
  • Serve as an authority in several Elasticsearch domains and continuously improve them.

Qualifications

  • Experience leading technical projects in the search infrastructure and distributed systems space.
  • Proven ability to mentor expert engineers and provide technical and professional guidance.
  • Experience defining a long-term technical vision for a core search or retrieval system across teams and organizations.
  • Hands-on experience with Elasticsearch, Lucene, or Solr.
  • Strong Core Java skills and familiarity with advanced data structures, concurrency, and modern Java features like lambdas.
  • Ability to work autonomously from concept to completion, including technical design and cross-team collaboration.
  • Experience with large-scale data or search systems (e.g., Elasticsearch, Lucene, Solr) or distributed storage engines.
  • Excellent verbal and written communication, with a collaborative, empathetic approach to distributed teams.

Skills

Required:Search infrastructureMentoringTechnical visionElasticsearch/Lucene/SolrJava

Benefits

  • Competitive pay based on the work you do here and not your previous salary
  • Health coverage for you and your family in many locations
  • Flexible locations and schedules for many roles
  • Generous number of vacation days each year
  • Company matches up to $2000 for charitable donations (or local equivalent)
  • Up to 40 hours per year for volunteer projects
  • Minimum of 16 weeks of parental leave
Last updated Sep 24, 2026. Interested? Apply on the company site.
Elastic logo

About Elastic

The open source platform that powers search, observability, security, and more ...

Power insights and outcomes with The Elastic Search AI Platform. See into your data and find answers that matter with enterprise solutions designed to help you accelerate time to insight.

searchobservabilitysecurityAIenterprise solutionsvector database
Company profileWebsite

More open roles at Elastic