Senior Software Engineer - Performance Tuning - Elasticsearch

About the Position

Senior Software Engineer - Performance Tuning - Elasticsearch

Spain

Elastic, the Search AI Company, enables everyone to find the answers they need in real time, using all their data, at scale - unleashing the potential of businesses and people. The Elastic Search AI Platform, used by more than 50% of the Fortune 500, brings together the precision of search and the intelligence of AI to enable everyone to accelerate the results that matter. By taking advantage of all structured and unstructured data - securing and protecting private information more effectively - Elastic’s complete, cloud-based solutions for search, security, and observability help organizations deliver on the promise of AI.

Responsibilities

• Contributing to core performance engineering initiatives from development to production, focusing on the delivery of impactful optimizations. Executing technical designs and plans for architectural and code-level performance improvements.
• Implementing foundational performance models and methodologies for complex, distributed systems.
• Supporting optimization strategies to ensure Elasticsearch remains performant, predictable, and scalable in diverse environments.
• Profiling and analyzing system behavior to identify bottlenecks in logging, metrics, vector search, and ES|QL.
• Ensuring robust performance benchmarks and regression detection for both stateful and stateless (Serverless) architectures.
• Collaborating with peers across the team to apply performance-focused development practices into new features.
• Contributing to automation efforts by building AI-assisted optimization harnesses that streamline profiling, hypothesis testing, and benchmarking.
• Providing technical guidance and peer reviews to other engineers, fostering a culture of technical excellence.

Requirements

• Deep knowledge of Java internals and JVM memory management. You understand how concurrency models work. You can write code that is high-performance, thread-safe, and lock-free. This experience includes working with large open-source and enterprise codebases.
• Proven experience in profiling and optimizing distributed systems. This includes deep experience with benchmarking tools (e.g., JMH, Rally), identifying performance regressions, and implementing algorithmic or hardware-aware optimizations.
• Solid comprehension of distributed systems architecture, including partition tolerance, cluster state propagation, and scaling challenges in large-scale data stores.
• Proven track record of using AI or advanced tooling to accelerate optimization, debug complex performance issues, and automate benchmarking workflows.
• Ability to collaborate effectively within a team environment, contributing to the success of performance engineering goals.
• Ability to collaborate across functions and teams and seamlessly transition between different projects, codebases, or teams based on business priorities.
• Ability to work autonomously, drive decisions, and result in a distributed team by leveraging asynchronous, direct, and transparent communication.

Nice to Have

• Experience integrating high-performance native libraries (e.g., C++, Rust, SIMD-accelerated code) into Java applications.
• Deep knowledge of modern storage engine performance, index modes, or vector search optimizations.
• Experience defining and managing Performance SLAs and success criteria for distributed systems.
• Experience working on the internals of a large-scale data store or search engine.
• Experience working on the internals of a data store or search engine.

We Offer

• Competitive salary in the range of €67.000-€106.000 EUR.
• Health coverage for you and your family in many locations.
• Ability to craft your calendar with flexible locations and schedules for many roles.
• Generous number of vacation days each year.
• Increase your impact - We match up to $2000 (or local currency equivalent) for financial donations and service.
• Up to 40 hours each year to use toward volunteer projects you love.
• Embracing parenthood with a minimum of 16 weeks of parental leave.

About the Company

Elastic is an equal opportunity employer and is committed to creating an inclusive culture that celebrates different perspectives, experiences, and backgrounds. Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, ethnicity, color, religion, sex, pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender perception or identity, national origin, age, marital status, protected veteran status, disability status, or any other basis protected by federal, state or local law, ordinance or regulation.

We welcome individuals with disabilities and strive to create an accessible and inclusive experience for all individuals. To request an accommodation during the application or the recruiting process, please email [email protected]. We will reply to your request within 24 business hours of submission.

Applicants have rights under Federal Employment Laws, view posters linked below: Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) Poster; Pay Transparency Nondiscrimination Provision Poster; Employee Polygraph Protection Act (EPPA) Poster and Know Your Rights (Poster)

Elasticsearch develops and distributes technology and information that is subject to U.S. and other countries’ export controls and licensing requirements for individuals who are located in or are nationals of the following sanctioned countries and regions: Belarus, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Syria, or Russia, including the Ukrainian territories annexed by Russia (The Crimea region of Ukraine, The Donetsk People's Republic (DNR), The Luhansk People's Republic (LNR), Kherson or Zaporizhzhia). If you are located in or are a national of one of the listed countries or regions, an export license may be required as a condition of your employment in this role. Please note that national origin and/or nationality do not affect eligibility for employment with Elastic.

Please see here for our Privacy Statement.