Strong engineering-focus, amazing people. - Senior Software Engineer SoundHound Employee Review

5.0
Feb 11, 2020
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

SoundHound has a very strong engineering focus baked into the culture. Management understands things like needing to take time to properly design systems, and trade-offs between techincal debt and launch schedules. People are excited to explore new technologies and see if it can solve problems for the team. All of my co-workers in the Boulder office are smart, kind, passionate, and interesting. Lots of social opportunities like lunches, happy hours, event nights, etc. SoundHound offers a weekly lunch stipend so typically people will go out together for lunch on Pearl Street. SoundHound pays for an RTD bus pass for employees, which makes commuting to/from Boulder super easy.

Cons

Short parental leave compared with similar companies. No 401k match. Still private, so stock options aren't worth as much as what you might get at other companies. HR has been understaffed for a long time, tried to hire several heads of HR and none have stayed.

Explore other reviews about SoundHound

5.0
Apr 2, 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Great people and hard problems.

Cons

None that I remember from then.

3.0
Apr 13, 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Small company tech perks; currently riding the momentum of AI excitement. There are some solid, intelligent managers especially on the engineering side that seek the good of their team members and protect them from politics. Flexible work and no meaningful return to office enforced

Cons

SoundHound used to be a place where excellence mattered over ego, where commitment to doing the right thing trumped politics. Where the goalpost was building great products with quality underlying technology. The goalposts have shifted, but it’s not clear to where. No longer does a movement toward building the best tech drive the team. Instead, a slew of acquisitions have made insecure politicking and delaying decisions the drivers to how the company clunks along from quarter to quarter. A lack of unity at the top trickles down to senior and middle management. It is no longer clear what the product priorities are and why, and there are too many VPs to count (and it’s unclear what being a VP/exec means - there is no minimum size of department or scope of responsibility to get that title, so it loses its credibility). Lots of talk and not a lot of action. They say the more someone talks about something, the less they are probably living it. When leaders talk about the importance of leadership, authenticity, and integrity, it often indicates they are not actually embodying those words.

2
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