Amazon Software Development Engineer reviews

If you're looking for a startup, Amazon is not it. It acts like one but you're unlikely to strike it rich. It still has some of that chaotic nature from the hey day of the internet boom. But it is a mature company. For me the biggest thing is the pager, I like most aspects of my job but carrying a pager is really grating on me. We've gotten better but my patience with the pager has starting to wear thin. Not to mention a couple of breakdowns over the years. Amazon is a place where you can lose your work life balance unless you're strong enough to advocate for yourself.

It feels like you are doing time in order to launch your career. The work is boring for the most part. The challenging problems you work on have more to do with sloppy design, lazy programming, horrible planning, than anything remotely interesting (from a computer science perspective). Amazon tries to preach this idea that you are working with the smartest people that you'll ever work with. This has been far from the case so far. Yes, there are some people there that are really brilliant, but those people really stick out since they are so rare. For the most part, the developers are solid, although they tend to be sloppy and careless. And there are some developers that actively try to avoid responsibility, make things difficult for others, or are openly hostile to people around them. Unfortunately, I've seen quite a few of these types while being there.