Software Development Engineer, Amazon Java Runtime
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The Java Runtimes Team (JRT) owns and advances the Java runtime that powers a large share of Amazon's production services. We work at the intersection of language runtimes, compilers, and hardware — tuning the JVM and its ecosystem so that thousands of services run faster, use less memory, and scale more efficiently across x86 and Graviton (AArch64) fleets. We contribute directly to OpenJDK and our Corretto JDK, and we build the tooling that turns deep runtime expertise into automated, fleet-wide performance gains.
We are hiring a Runtime Engineer to work across three closely-linked areas: the JIT compiler, garbage collection, and systems-level software optimization. You will profile real production workloads, identify runtime bottlenecks, prototype and land improvements in the JVM, and help encode that expertise into tools that scale beyond one-to-one consultation.
Key job responsibilities
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.
About the team
Amazon Software Builder Experience (ASBX), started in 2022, is working to make Amazon the best place to build software. Every day, hundreds of thousands of Amazon software builders rely on us for the tools they build with, and for the technology, training, and community behind them. One of our most important responsibilities is shaping the language ecosystem, both inside Amazon and across the open-source community, to improve the experience for every software builder.
We are hiring a Runtime Engineer to work across three closely-linked areas: the JIT compiler, garbage collection, and systems-level software optimization. You will profile real production workloads, identify runtime bottlenecks, prototype and land improvements in the JVM, and help encode that expertise into tools that scale beyond one-to-one consultation.
Key job responsibilities
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.
About the team
Amazon Software Builder Experience (ASBX), started in 2022, is working to make Amazon the best place to build software. Every day, hundreds of thousands of Amazon software builders rely on us for the tools they build with, and for the technology, training, and community behind them. One of our most important responsibilities is shaping the language ecosystem, both inside Amazon and across the open-source community, to improve the experience for every software builder.