{"id":1206230,"url":"https://alion.io/job/sonos-principal-software-development-engineer","title":"Principal Software Development Engineer","company":{"id":3723,"name":"Sonos","domain":"sonos.com","url":"https://alion.io/company/sonos","size_band":"501-1000","is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Workday","truth_index":{"grade":"B","score":80,"open_postings":5,"ghost_share":0,"stale_share":1,"repost_share":0,"time_to_fill_p50_days":20,"computed_at":"2026-09-26T05:45:00Z"}},"role":"Backend","role_family":"Backend","seniority":"lead","employment_type":"full_time","work_mode":"hybrid","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["Boston, United States","Seattle, United States"],"countries":["US"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":{"min":190000,"max":237500,"currency":"USD","period":"year","gross":null,"usd_annual":237500},"salary_estimate":null,"experience_years_min":8,"visa_sponsorship":true,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"C++","optional":false},{"name":"Rest API","optional":false},{"name":"WebSockets","optional":false},{"name":"CI/CD","optional":true},{"name":"Git","optional":true}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-09-24T23:59:02Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-09-24","last_verified_at":"2026-09-26T19:28:50Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":2,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":null,"flags":[],"days_open":2},"description":"At Sonos we want to create the ultimate listening experience for our customers and know that it starts by listening to each other. As part of the Sonos team, you’ll collaborate with people of all styles, skill sets, and backgrounds to realize our vision while fostering a community where everyone feels included and empowered to do the best work of their lives.\nAt Sonos we want to create the ultimate listening experience for our customers and know that it starts by listening to each other. As part of the Sonos team, you’ll collaborate with people of all styles, skill sets, and backgrounds to realize our vision while fostering a community where everyone feels included and empowered to do the best work of their lives.\nAs a Principal Embedded Software Engineer on the Player API & Control team, you will lead performance-critical and customer-facing initiatives across the Sonos player stack. You will have a direct impact on the responsiveness, scalability, and reliability of core playback and control experiences. This role sits at the intersection of embedded systems, distributed communication protocols, telemetry, and cross-platform API design.\nYou will work across teams including App, Cloud, Security, Data, and QA to identify performance bottlenecks, design architectural improvements, and ensure measurable customer impact. If you love solving deep technical challenges, analyzing real-world data, and delivering meaningful improvements to millions of listeners, we want to talk with you.\nThis is a hybrid position, allowing for a combination of remote work and in-office collaboration. Qualified applicants must live within commuting distance of our Boston or Seattle office locations and should expect to be in office a minimum of 3 days per week.\nWhat You’ll Do\nLead performance and reliability initiatives across the Sonos APIs.\nThis engineer will work on Player Control components and participate in developing software for enabling new products\nCollaborate across teams to mentor local junior peers and facilitate internal development and testing.\nParticipate in all aspects of the software development life cycle including planning, requirements, development, and testing.\nAct as a customer advocate by participating in the product definition and planning process.\nSupport service initiatives that adhere to best practices for security, scalability, cost, and overall performance.\nIdentify and eliminate latency bottlenecks in player-to-app and player-to-cloud communication.\nDesign and implement architectural improvements (e.g., async command execution, protocol optimizations, reduced handshake overhead).\nUse telemetry and customer data to correlate code changes to real-world impact.\nPartner cross-functionally with App, UX, PM, and Data teams to improve end-to-end user experience.\nMentor engineers through design reviews, code reviews, architecture discussions, and root cause investigations.\nProactively investigate system-level issues before they escalate into customer-impacting problems.\nPresent performance findings and architectural proposals to engineering leadership and broader forums.\nWhat You’ll Need\nBasic Qualifications\nBachelor’s Degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or equivalent experience.\n8+ years of experience in embedded or systems-level software engineering.\nStrong proficiency in C++.\nExperience working with REST and/or WebSocket-based APIs.\nExperience debugging complex, multi-threaded systems.\nExperience working with telemetry, instrumentation, or performance measurement frameworks.\nDeep understanding of networking fundamentals (TLS/mTLS, WebSocket, HTTP, LAN communication).\nThis role requires commuting distance to our main engineering office in Seattle or Boston.\nPreferred Qualifications\nExperience optimizing embedded systems for performance and memory constraints.\nExperience with secure communication protocols (TLS, DTLS, authentication flows).\nExperience analyzing large-scale telemetry datasets to drive engineering decisions.\nFamiliarity with distributed systems and device-to-device communication.\nExperience with CI/CD systems and modern Git workflows.\nFamiliarity with Sonos architecture or similar control-plane systems.\nExperience presenting technical proposals to senior engineering leadership.\nImpact of This Role\nThis role will directly influence:\nPlayback latency and responsiveness\nPlayer Control components\nCommand execution performance across devices\nCustomer-reported reliability metrics\nCross-team API usability and scalability\nThe long-term architecture of the Player API platform\nThis is a senior-level IC5 role expected to operate with autonomy, technical depth, and cross-team influence.\nResearch shows that candidates from underrepresented backgrounds often don’t apply for roles if they don’t meet all the criteria. We encourage you to apply even if you don’t meet every requirement.\nVisa Sponsorship: Sonos is unable to sponsor or take over sponsorship of an employment visa for this role at this time. We ask that applicants be authorized to work for any US employer, both now and in the future.\nYour profile will be reviewed and you'll hear from us once we have an update. At Sonos we take the time to hire right and appreciate your patience.\nThe base pay range for this role based off geographic location is:\n$190,000 and $237,500The specific pay offered will depend on the candidate’s geographic location, as well as qualifications and experience. We apply geographic pay differentials based on the cost of labor in the market. Employees in high-cost locations may be compensated at the upper end of the range, while those in medium or low cost markets may be compensated at the lower end of the range. Your recruiter can provide more details about the specific salary range for your location during the hiring process.\nPlease note that compensation details listed in US job postings reflect the base salary only, and do not include bonus, equity, or benefits.\nWe also offer a comprehensive benefits program with choice and flexibility in mind to help support the health, wealth, and overall well-being of our employees. Regular full time employees in the US are eligible for benefits on day one, including:\nMedical, Dental, and Vision Insurance\n\nA 401(k) plan with company matching and immediate vesting\n\nAn Open Time Off policy (OTO) so you have maximum opportunity to disconnect and recharge, with no tenure-based vacation accruals required\n\n80 hours of sick time upon hire, refreshed annually\n\nUp to 12 paid holidays per calendar year\n\nSonos offers a generous paid leave program for new parents or to care for a family member with a serious health condition, as well as short- and long-term disability for your own medical condition\n\nCompany-paid Disability, Life, and AD&D Insurance\n\nVoluntary benefits, including Voluntary Life, AD&D, Accident, and Pet Insurance\n\nMental health benefits to support your holistic well-being\n\nA generous employee discount program & Sonos Radio HD - on us!\n\nNote: No amount of pay is considered to be wages or compensation until such amount is earned, vested, and determinable. The amount and availability of any bonus, benefits, or any other form of compensation and benefits that are allocable to a particular employee remains in the Company's sole discretion unless and until paid and may be modified at the Company’s sole discretion, consistent with the law.\nNotice to U.S. Job Applicants: Sonos is an equal opportunity employer. We evaluate qualified applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, veteran status, and other legally protected characteristics.\nSonos is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodations to individuals with disabilities. If you need a reasonable accommodation because of a disability for any part of the employment process, please send an e-mail to  and let us know the nature of your request and your contact information.","description_format":"text","description_chars":8018,"description_truncated":false,"requirements":{"experience_years_min":8,"management_years_min":null,"team_size_min":null,"manages_managers":false,"education":{"level":"bachelor","optional":false},"security_clearance":false,"languages":[]},"benefits":["Equity","Vision insurance"],"hiring_locations":[{"name":"United States","iso":"US","kind":"country"}],"hiring_excludes":[],"relocation_offered":false,"industries":["Consumer Electronics","Headphones & Audio","Home Cinema"],"lifecycle":[{"event":"open","at":"2026-09-24T23:59:02Z"}],"liveness":{"score":90,"band":"hot","label":"Hiring now","p_open":1,"p_active":0.903,"p_room":1,"age_days":1,"expected_fill_days":20,"reasons":["conf:5","velocity","win:early"],"computed_at":"2026-09-26T05:45:00Z"},"pay":{"stated_usd_annual":237500,"is_top_pay":true},"html_url":"https://alion.io/job/sonos-principal-software-development-engineer","json_url":"https://alion.io/job/sonos-principal-software-development-engineer.json","meta":{"generated_at":"2026-09-27T00:24:34Z","cache_seconds":300,"methodology":"https://alion.io/methodology","terms":"https://alion.io/terms","contact":"https://alion.io/contact","api":"https://alion.io/developers","usage":{"tier":"crawler","counted_by":"address","units_charged":1,"used_today":361,"day_limit":5000,"remaining_today":4639,"minute_limit":60,"resets_at":"2026-09-28T00:00:00Z"}}}