Machine Learning Engineer Intern (Search E-commerce) - 2025 Summer (MS)

Responsibilities
TikTok is the leading destination for short-form mobile video. At TikTok, our mission is to inspire creativity and bring joy. TikTok's global headquarters are in Los Angeles and Singapore, and its offices include New York, London, Dublin, Paris, Berlin, Dubai, Jakarta, Seoul, and Tokyo.
Why Join Us
Creation is the core of TikTok's purpose. Our platform is built to help imaginations thrive. This is doubly true of the teams that make TikTok possible.
Together, we inspire creativity and bring joy - a mission we all believe in and aim towards achieving every day.
To us, every challenge, no matter how difficult, is an opportunity; to learn, to innovate, and to grow as one team. Status quo? Never. Courage? Always.
At TikTok, we create together and grow together. That's how we drive impact - for ourselves, our company, and the communities we serve.
Join us.
Team Introduction
The Search E-Commerce team is responsible for the search algorithm for TikTok's rapidly growing global e-commerce business. We use state-of-the-art large-scale machine learning technology, the cutting-edge NLP, CV and multi-modal technology to build the industry's top-class search engine to provide the best e-commerce search experience, for more than 1 billion monthly active TikTok users around the world. Our mission is to build a world where "there is no hard-to-sell good-priced product in the world".
We are looking for talented individuals to join us for an internship in 2025. Internships at TikTok aim to offer students industry exposure and hands-on experience. Turn your ambitions into reality as your inspiration brings infinite opportunities at TikTok.
Internships at TikTok aim to provide students with hands-on experience in developing fundamental skills and exploring potential career paths. A vibrant blend of social events and enriching development workshops will be available for you to explore. Here, you will utilize your knowledge in real-world scenarios while laying a strong foundation for personal and professional growth. This Internship Program runs for 12 weeks beginning in May/June 2025. Successful candidates must be able to commit to one of the following summer internship start dates below:
Monday, May 12
Monday, May 19
Tuesday May 27 (Memorial Day May 26)
Monday, June 9
Monday, June 23
We will prioritize candidates who are able to commit to these start dates. Please state your availability clearly in your resume (Start date, End date).
Candidates can apply to a maximum of two positions and will be considered for jobs in the order you apply. The application limit is applicable to TikTok and its affiliates' jobs globally. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis - we encourage you to apply early.
Online Assessment
Candidates who pass resume evaluation will be invited to participate in TikTok's technical online assessment in HackerRank.
Responsibilities
-Improve the basic search quality and user experience: Optimize query analysis and text relevance matching. Understand e-commerce video content and implement multi-modal matching. Improve users' perception of product authority, and deeply participate in the design and implementation of core search products. Comprehensively improve the end-to-end shopping experience from browsing to after-sales.
- Design and implement the end-to-end ranking system (recall, first stage ranking, final stage ranking and mixed row): Improve users' personalized shopping interests model. Improve the shopping conversion efficiency for merchandise, video and live stream to promote GMV growth.
- Promote the healthy development of the ecosystem: From the perspective of the industry and businesses, solve challenging problems such as supply and demand matching, business cold start, and sustainable business growth, etc. Think, analyze and adjust the evolution of the system to achieve long-term and sustainable growth of GMV.
Qualifications
Minimum Qualifications:
-Currently pursuing an Master in Computer Science or a related technical discipline
-Able to commit to working for 12 weeks during Summer 2025
-Must obtain work authorization in country of employment at the time of hire, and maintain ongoing work authorization during employment.
- Excellent coding skills. Solid knowledge of data structure and algorithms.
- Excellent in analysis, modeling and problem-solving, and can see the essence of problems from complex data.
- Publication records in top journals or conferences will be a plus. Experience winning ACM-ICPC medals will be a plus.
Preferred Qualifications
-Graduating December 2025 onwards with the intent to return to degree program after the completion of the internship.
TikTok is committed to creating an inclusive space where employees are valued for their skills, experiences, and unique perspectives. Our platform connects people from across the globe and so does our workplace. At TikTok, our mission is to inspire creativity and bring joy. To achieve that goal, we are committed to celebrating our diverse voices and to creating an environment that reflects the many communities we reach. We are passionate about this and hope you are too.
TikTok is committed to providing reasonable accommodations in our recruitment processes for candidates with disabilities, pregnancy, sincerely held religious beliefs or other reasons protected by applicable laws. If you need assistance or a reasonable accommodation, please reach out to us at