Amazon Software Development Engineering reviews

3.5

57% would recommend to a friend

(6,775 total reviews)
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Andrew Jassy

40% approve of CEO

54% positive business outlook

Software Development Engineering employees have rated Amazon with 3.5 out of 5 stars, based on 6,775 company reviews on Glassdoor. This indicates that most Software Development Engineering professionals have a good working experience there. Amazon is rated in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) by Software Development Engineering professionals compared to other employers within the IT (Information Technology) industry (3.9 stars).

Reviews by job title

7K reviews
5.0
Oct 2, 2008
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Small teams encourage start-up-like mentality and working environment. Compensation is top-notch. All teams are limited to some 8-9 people, which allows each person to assume a comprehensive role covering all aspects of software development. The job also gives very interesting technical challenges.

Cons

Lack of benefits, health plan is lacking, company is "cheap". Company seems unwilling to spend on equipment, perks, and other niceties to improve productivity.

5.0
Sep 21, 2008
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Amazon is packed full of opportunities. There's plenty of space to grow both personally and technically and challenges abound. The real beauty of the place is that individual groups and teams are given nearly full reign in how they operate as long as they produce the desired results. This level of freedom means that those teams which require strict SDLC methodologies to meet high availability requirements can apply those, while teams who do not require as strict of a methodology are also free to explore agile approaches. There are lots of available tools for working in certain ways, but teams are not required to use those tools and are welcome to use others of their own choosing. This freedom keeps the work environment fresh and interesting, even as Amazon has grown into a truly large company. The other aspect of Amazon that is truly rewarding is the "ownership" attitude that is fostered. Not code ownership, per se, but rather company ownership. Any employee is encouraged to think about how the project they are doing improves customer experience, drives down costs, and overall improves the business. Anyone can say "I don't think that this is a good customer experience," and people tend to listen.

Cons

In short: Chaos. We haves it. I've personally witnessed complete priority shifts take place in 24 hours. If you are the kind of person who will be upset if the project you were working on for the past 2 weeks (or months) suddenly gets tabled in favor of some super ultra high priority mission, you won't like it here. Personally, this doesn't bother me. Both the tabled project and the new one will generally be interesting, and if the tabled project had a real business need behind it, it will come back around to completion one day down the road :).

2.0
Sep 14, 2008
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

There aren't too many rules or established ways of doing things so if you're the type who wants to try out new things, write new code or that kind of thing you'd love it. You wont hear No as long as it doesn't cost the company money. If it doesnt cost any money then you can do virtually anything you want. Probably half the cool stuff on our site comes from ideas people had and tried out on their own. It is definitely a good place for people without much else going on in their lives because your not going to have time for any thing else.

Cons

The hours are very long. Expect 12 hour days at a minimum and you will work every weekend, except they give everybody a laptop so you can work at home so some of that 12 hours is at home at night too. Everybody has a blackberry because its expected that you be available at all times, even when you're on vacation. If you want a work life balance, start running in the other direction. Its basically an environment of work the person as hard as you can as long as you can, and when they collapse and die, people say they just didn't have what it takes.

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