Senior Software Engineer - Xbox Video

Microsoft

Microsoft

Software Engineering

United States

Posted on Apr 15, 2026
Overview

The Xbox Video team is looking for a Senior Software Engineer who is passionate about building high-quality video experiences on cutting-edge hardware and software platforms. Our team is responsible for delivering the video technologies that power Xbox experiences used by missions around the world.

In this role, you'll work across the Windows platform and Xbox video stack, helping build and optimize the APIs and system-level components that interact directly with advanced graphics and video hardware. You'll contribute to technologies such as video encoding and decoding, color processing, motion estimation, and rate control to ensure smooth, high-performance playback across devices.

You'll be part of a collaborative and experienced engineering team that works closely with internal and external partners to solve complex technical challenges across the Xbox ecosystem. While prior experience with media or video technologies is a plus, you'll be successful in this role if you enjoy working close to the system - across operating systems, APIs, and platform-level code - to deliver impactful user experiences.

Microsoft’s mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. As employees, we come together with a growth mindset, innovate to empower others, and collaborate to realize our shared goals. Each day we build on our values of respect, integrity, and accountability to create a culture of inclusion where everyone can thrive at work and beyond.



Responsibilities
  • Collaborates with appropriate stakeholders to determine user requirements for a scenario.
  • Drives identification of dependencies and the development of design documents for a product, application, service, or platform.
  • Creates, implements, optimizes, debugs, refactors, and reuses code to establish and improve performance and maintainability, effectiveness, and return on investment (ROI).
  • Leverages subject-matter expertise of product features and partners with appropriate stakeholders (e.g., project managers) to drive a workgroup's project plans, release plans, and work items.
  • Acts as a Designated Responsible Individual (DRI) and guides other engineers by developing and following the playbook, working on call to monitor system/product/service for degradation, downtime, or interruptions, alerting stakeholders about status and initiates actions to restore system/product/service for simple and complex problems when appropriate.
  • Proactively seeks new knowledge and adapts to new trends, technical solutions, and patterns that will improve the availability, reliability, efficiency, observability, and performance of products while also driving consistency in monitoring and operations at scale.
  • Embody our culture and values.


Qualifications

Required Qualifications:

  • Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science or related technical field AND 4+ years technical engineering experience with coding in languages including, but not limited to, C or C++,
    • OR equivalent experience.

Other Requirements: Ability to meet Microsoft, customer and/or government security screening requirements are required for this role. These requirements include but are not limited to the following specialized security screenings:

  • Microsoft Cloud Background Check: This position will be required to pass the Microsoft Cloud background check upon hire/transfer and every two years thereafter.

Preferred Qualifications:

  • 3+ years of experience contributing to operating systems, application programming interface (API), or device drivers for consumer PCs or electronics.
  • 2+ years of experience developing software for the Windows platform, including work at the platform, API, or media systems level.
  • Interest and experience in all things video and video hardware.
  • Proficiency in design, coding, debugging, and problem solving skills.

#W+DJOBS



Software Engineering IC4 - The typical base pay range for this role across the U.S. is USD $119,800 - $234,700 per year. There is a different range applicable to specific work locations, within the San Francisco Bay area and New York City metropolitan area, and the base pay range for this role in those locations is USD $158,400 - $258,000 per year.

Certain roles may be eligible for benefits and other compensation. Find additional benefits and pay information here:
https://careers.microsoft.com/us/en/us-corporate-pay


This position will be open for a minimum of 5 days, with applications accepted on an ongoing basis until the position is filled.




Microsoft is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, citizenship, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, immigration status, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran or military status, race, ethnicity, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable local laws, regulations and ordinances. If you need assistance with religious accommodations and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application process, read more about requesting accommodations.