Research Intern

Overview

Research Internships at Microsoft offer a dynamic setting for research careers, with world-class research labs led by globally recognized scientists and engineers. These teams pursue innovation across scientific and technical disciplines, tackling complex challenges in areas such as computing, healthcare, economics, and the environment.

Documents are among the richest forms in which human knowledge is created and shared, blending language, visual structure, tables, images, and domain-specific conventions. The team is building the next generation of document intelligence systems that can perceive, understand, and reason over this multimodal content. As a Research Intern, you will explore new models and learning techniques that push forward document understanding, from fundamental research to demanding real-world scenarios. You will work with researchers and engineers to test new ideas at scale and turn research advances into practical AI capabilities. Strong machine learning research experience and an interest in multimodal AI, computer vision, natural language processing, or related areas are sought.

Responsibilities

Research Interns put inquiry and theory into practice. Working alongside doctoral candidates and some of the world's leading researchers, interns learn, collaborate, and build professional networks. Interns advance their own careers while contributing to meaningful research and development. During the 12-week internship, interns are paired with mentors and collaborate with other interns and researchers, present findings, and take part in the community. Research internships span all areas of research and are offered year-round, though they typically begin in the summer.

Qualifications

Required Qualifications

• Currently enrolled in a Doctorate Degree program in Computer Science, STEM, or a relevant field.

Other Requirements

• Research Interns must be physically located at their manager's Microsoft worksite location for the duration of the internship.
• Applicants must submit at least two reference letters, a cover letter, and any relevant work or research samples. Reference letters can only be requested after the application is submitted and may not be requested for every candidate. It is advisable to alert your letter writers in advance.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience conducting research in document intelligence, document understanding, multimodal AI, computer vision, natural language processing, or related areas.
• Experience with large language models, vision-language models, or other multimodal foundation models.
• Experience developing machine learning systems using Python and modern deep learning frameworks such as PyTorch.
• Ability to define research questions, design experiments, establish evaluation methods, and analyze results.
• Prior research experience shown through peer-reviewed publications, research internships, or significant research projects.
• Experience working with researchers and engineers to turn research ideas into prototypes or practical AI systems.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, including presenting research through papers, technical reports, posters, or presentations.

Compensation

The base pay range for this internship is USD $6,810 to $13,480 per month. In the San Francisco Bay Area and New York City metropolitan area, the base pay range is USD $8,920 to $14,610 per month.

Certain roles may be eligible for benefits and other compensation. Additional benefits and pay information is available at https://careers.microsoft.com/us/en/us-intern-pay.

Microsoft accepts applications and processes offers for these roles on an ongoing basis throughout the academic calendar (September to April). The position will remain open for a minimum of 5 days, with applications accepted until it is filled.

Microsoft is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, citizenship, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, immigration status, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran or military status, race, ethnicity, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable local laws, regulations and ordinances. For religious accommodations or reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application process, see the accessibility page for requesting accommodations.