Was a great place a few years ago, now its so so. - Computer Scientist Adobe Employee Review

3.0
Jan 19, 2010
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Decent pay, many very smart people who care about the products. There are opportunities to learn with lectures and if you are lucky, conferences. The Adobe name is recognized for quality and good products and there is some prestige associated with working here.

Cons

Long hours, tight deadlines, ever decreasing workforce and offshoring of projects. The management, with the acquisition of Macromedia a few years ago, has become obsessed with Flash, AIR, and enterprise software. Unfortunately, this is leaving a lot of brilliant engineers who have worked long and hard at making Adobe what it is with Photoshop, Illustrator, et al, feeling frustrated and left behind. On top of this Adobe has laid off an enormous number of people from these key areas in the last couple years and shuffled portions to India and now China. If you are a US employee it is difficult not to have the sinking feeling the ax is going to fall at any moment. The company has also recently changed their long standing excellent PTO and benefits and under the new system employees get sick time, fixed holidays and shutdowns, and additional time off "at the discretion of your manager." I really don't mind the changes except for the loss of rea PTO for vacations. HR says you haven't lost vacation but if your manager is highly strung like mine taking a vacation might be difficult. In summary - Adobe was a great place with innovative ideas and excellent engineering as its priorities. Now, the Flash platform is the top priority and frankly I have my doubts its will succeed.

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5.0
Jun 10, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

all good things considered to work here

Cons

often times, it can feel pretty boring

4.0
Jun 16, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

* Refreshing focus on employee wellness * Brilliant colleagues * Compelling problems on interesting tools * Good work/life balance culture... generally (see cons) I've been at a few big tech companies and Adobe is one of my favorites. I feel empowered to make impactful changes here, I'm constantly stretching myself in fun ways, and the products we make are incredible. Product and engineering have big dreams, and all the resources we need to realize them.

Cons

* Big time crunch culture around arbitrary goals By far my biggest disappointment has been just how hard product pushes on big projects with arbitrary deadlines and difficult scope. It turns into cutting corners and delivering sub-par experiences even though we absolutely have the talent and capability to make some exceptional things if we just let the dang thing bake a few more months. I'd be more impressed with the tight clip if the goals were reasonable for good business reasons, but as far as I can tell the reason usually boils down to "some high-level manager wanted X and thought Y sounded like a good target date". * Comp growth leaves something to be desired. Raises feel pretty flat, though it's not the worst thing since stock rewards can be pretty good as appropriate for performance. Career progression is pretty good here too - I just find it odd how stale the base pay increases are year to year.

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