Senior Software Development Engineer Visa Sponsorship Jobs in Illinois
Illinois is one of the strongest markets for senior software development engineer visa sponsorship, anchored by Chicago's deep tech ecosystem. Major employers including Groupon, Morningstar, Motorola Solutions, and a growing cluster of fintech and healthcare IT firms actively hire and sponsor senior engineers. The state's concentration of Fortune 500 headquarters adds further demand for experienced, sponsored technical talent.
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At Expedia Group, we help travelers explore the world, one journey at a time. As a global travel company powered by passionate people, trusted partnerships, and leading technology, we connect travelers, partners, and advertisers through our consumer brands, B2B network, and travel advertising business.
Here, you'll do meaningful work that helps millions of people discover, book, and experience travel with more ease, confidence, and joy. Our five Behaviors - Traveler First, Think Big, Operate with Excellence, Ownership Mindset, and Succeed Together - help foster a supportive environment where people can grow their careers and have the flexibility, benefits, and support to do their best work. Join us and build for travelers everywhere.
Senior Software Development Engineer (Content)
Introduction to the team
Expedia Technology teams partner with our Product teams to create innovative products, services, and tools to deliver high-quality experiences for travelers, partners, and our employees. A singular technology platform powered by data and machine learning provides secure, differentiated, and personalized experiences that drive loyalty and traveler satisfaction.
Within Expedia Product & Technology, our Content organization enables Expedia Group to acquire, enrich and distribute hundreds of millions of assets (images, texts, attributes, videos, etc.) used across our various brands and lines of businesses. While planning your next trip on Expedia Group websites or mobile applications, every step of your experience was enhanced by our Content!
Our team is dedicated to delivering highly scalable software solutions in an agile development environment, using state-of-the-art technologies. Our culture provides a safe environment to spark creativity and encourage continuous learning and growth. Much of our development is on back-end services. We work in a DevOps model where developers are involved in all aspects of software development from design to test, implementation, deployment, monitoring and support.
In this role, you will:
- Design, build, and evolve complex services, APIs, and data models that power Expedia Group’s content and product catalog experiences, ensuring high availability, reliability, and performance.
- Lead system design and low-level design (LLD) efforts for content and catalog services, including API design, contracts, and data modeling that enable scalable and reusable solutions across multiple domains.
- Drive end-to-end delivery for multi-service features, from technical discovery and design through implementation, testing, deployment, and operational support, raising the engineering bar for the team.
- Collaborate closely with product, architecture, and partner engineering teams to define technical requirements and deliver content capabilities that are reusable across lines of business and markets.
- Champion engineering excellence by improving CI/CD pipelines, observability, operational readiness, and incident response for content systems, while mentoring other engineers in best practices.
- Safely integrate and operate AI/ML-enabled and AI-assisted solutions into content workflows and services, applying AI/ML concepts to real-world products and improving content quality, coverage, and developer productivity.
Minimum Qualifications:
- Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or a related technical field; or Equivalent related professional experience.
- 8+ years of relevant professional experience.
- Several years of professional software development experience owning one or more backend or full-stack services in a production environment, including design, implementation, testing, deployment, and operations.
- Proven experience designing and implementing service-oriented or microservice architectures for complex content or catalog-like domains, including API design, data modeling, and low-level/system design.
- Proficiency in one or more modern programming languages (Kotlin or Java preferred) and associated frameworks, plus strong skills working with relational or NoSQL databases (Redis/Valkey, Cassandra and ScyllaDB preferred), including schema design and data access patterns for content systems.
Preferred Qualifications:
- Experience designing and operating large-scale, high-throughput content, catalog, or similar distributed systems with strong focus on performance, availability, resiliency, and cost efficiency.
- Demonstrated leadership in driving architecture and technical direction across multiple services or a domain, including evolving APIs, contracts, data models, and integration patterns in partnership with architecture and product.
- Strong track record of improving engineering efficiency and reliability through automation, CI/CD optimization, test strategy, observability, and operational excellence for mission-critical services.
- Familiarity with AI-driven systems, tools, or workflows and applying AI/ML concepts to real world products, including safely integrating AI/ML-enabled solutions into existing content services and pipelines.
- Experience applying AI or ML techniques to content-centric or data-rich systems (for example, classification, enrichment, deduplication, or recommendation) to enhance content quality, coverage, and developer effectiveness.
- Experience leveraging translation, localization and internationalization tools and technologies.
The total cash range for this position in Chicago is $171,500.00 to $240,000.00. Employees in this role have the potential to increase their pay up to $274,500.00, which is the top of the range, based on ongoing, demonstrated, and sustained performance in the role.
Starting pay for this role will vary based on multiple factors, including location, available budget, and an individual’s knowledge, skills, and experience. Pay ranges may be modified in the future.
Benefits and perks
Expedia Group offers benefits and perks designed to support employees and their families, including medical, dental, and vision coverage, paid time off, an Employee Assistance Program, wellness and travel reimbursement, travel discounts, and International Airlines Travel Agent Network (IATAN) membership. Learn more about life at Expedia Group at https://careers.expediagroup.com/life.
Accommodation requests
Expedia Group is committed to providing an inclusive and accessible recruiting experience. If you need an accommodation or adjustment due to a disability during the application or recruiting process, please submit a request at https://expedia.service-now.com/askeg?id=job_accommodation.
About Expedia Group
Expedia Group includes three flagship consumer brands - Expedia, Hotels.com, and Vrbo - along with a leading B2B travel business and travel advertising offerings. Across our brands and business, we help travelers explore the world with confidence and ease.
Important notice
Employment opportunities and job offers at Expedia Group will always come from Expedia Group's Talent Acquisition and hiring teams. Never share sensitive personal information unless you are confident of the recipient. Expedia Group does not extend job offers via email or messaging tools to individuals with whom we have not made prior contact. Our email domain is @expediagroup.com. The official place to find and apply for roles is https://careers.expediagroup.com/jobs/.
Equal Opportunity
Expedia is committed to creating an inclusive work environment with a diverse workforce. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. This employer participates in E-Verify. The employer will provide the Social Security Administration (SSA) and, if necessary, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) with information from each new employee's I-9 to confirm work authorization.
Senior Software Development Engineer Job Roles in Illinois
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Search Senior Software Development Engineer Jobs in IllinoisSenior Software Development Engineer Jobs in Illinois: Frequently Asked Questions
Which companies in Illinois sponsor visas for senior software development engineers?
Several large Illinois employers have established H-1B visa sponsorship track records for senior software development engineer roles. These include Motorola Solutions, Morningstar, Allstate, Discover Financial, United Airlines, and Hyatt Technologies. Chicago's fintech sector, including firms like Avant and Enova, also sponsors senior engineers regularly. Enterprise technology companies and consulting firms with Chicago offices, such as Accenture and Thoughtworks, are among the more consistent sponsors in this role category.
Which visa types are most common for senior software development engineer roles in Illinois?
The H-1B is the most common visa category for senior software development engineers in Illinois. Software engineering consistently qualifies as a specialty occupation requiring at least a bachelor's degree in computer science, software engineering, or a related field. Candidates already in the U.S. on OPT or STEM OPT may also transition to H-1B through employer sponsorship. The O-1A is an option for engineers with documented exceptional achievements, though it requires substantial evidence of distinction.
Which cities in Illinois have the most senior software development engineer sponsorship jobs?
Chicago accounts for the overwhelming majority of senior software development engineer sponsorship opportunities in Illinois. The Loop, River North, and the Fulton Market tech corridor are the densest hiring areas. Suburban clusters in Schaumburg and Deerfield also have notable employer presence, particularly in enterprise software and telecommunications. Outside the Chicago metro, opportunities are significantly more limited, making geographic flexibility within the region an advantage for sponsored candidates.
How to find senior software development engineer visa sponsorship jobs in Illinois?
Migrate Mate is built specifically for international candidates seeking visa sponsorship roles, including senior software development engineer positions in Illinois. The platform filters jobs by sponsorship willingness, saving you from applying to roles where sponsorship is not on offer. Given how competitive senior engineering roles in Chicago can be, focusing your search on employers with documented H-1B filing histories, as reflected in Migrate Mate's listings, significantly improves your targeting and application efficiency.
Are there any Illinois-specific considerations for senior software development engineers seeking visa sponsorship?
Illinois employers sponsoring H-1B workers must pay at least the Department of Labor prevailing wage for the specific role and location, which for senior software development engineers in the Chicago metro reflects a highly competitive market rate. The University of Illinois system, particularly UIUC, produces a significant pipeline of international engineering graduates who seek Illinois-based sponsorship, meaning competition among sponsored candidates in this state can be high. Employers in regulated industries like finance and insurance, which are prominent in Chicago, may also have longer internal approval processes before extending sponsorship offers.
What is the prevailing wage for sponsored senior software development engineer jobs in Illinois?
U.S. employers sponsoring a visa must pay at least the prevailing wage, which is what workers in the same role, area, and experience level typically earn. The Department of Labor sets this rate to make sure companies aren't hiring foreign workers simply because they'd accept lower pay than a U.S. worker. It varies by job title, location, and experience. You can look up current prevailing wage rates for any occupation and location using the OFLC Wage Search page.