Canonical reviews

3.3

51% would recommend to a friend

(440 total reviews)

Mark Shuttleworth

43% approve of CEO

48% positive business outlook

Canonical has an employee rating of 3.3 out of 5 stars, based on 440 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The Canonical employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Information Technology industry (3.9 stars).

Reviews by job title

440 reviews
1.0
Jun 25, 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- Remote work opportunity - Learning budget

Cons

- Awful micromanagement. Everything is supervised and dictated by the executive and HR. Disgusting to see and feel that HR has a lot more power than any other team. - Interview process takes around 6 months in average, even internal applications like promotion or team change take 3-4 months. - Promotion depends 99% on how other people sees and evaluates you, so if you are a person who prefers to focus on their job instead of making friends, licking some and speaking more than doing, then good luck! - Sometimes it feels like there is no defined scope of work, whatever brings money in, you do it. - It's almost impossible to survive if you are a new joiner. There's this system where they easily fire you depending on others' views. They compare you with other roles, teams and even levels. That's applicable to all, but many senior employees have already formed groups, where they just give good reviews to each other and protect themselves. - A big ratio of employees are seriously demotivated and do their job as a best effort yet nobody raises their opinion, because no one believes something would actually change, so people eventually become really toxic and ignorant. - Unfair work environment and salary matrix.

1.0
May 27, 2025

Horrible

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Honestly, run, like its a red flag, like just looking at the hiring process, its horrible.

Cons

Run away if you can, you should have known its a red flag from seeing the whole application process

3.0
May 22, 2025

Not Terrible Not Great

Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- ICs are almost always great people. - Depending on your background you learn a lot. - Salary and benefits almost always match and even exceed local companies. - Fully remote since 2004 and always will be. - Travel.

Cons

- Teams are chronically underfilled and roadmaps are chronically overcommitted. - Depending on the team, you can be a one person startup with all the responsibilities you have. - Work is inefficient. It is hard to deliver on things here. Some people work the evenings to work without interruptions. - Performance reviews are a black-box and based on people's feelings. But they are a gate to your raises, bonuses, and promotions. - Company stance shifted against the employee during the post-pandemic crash. - Travel becomes a chore.

Viewing 43 - 45 of 440 Reviews

Glassdoor has 510 Canonical reviews submitted anonymously by Canonical employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Canonical is right for you.