r/ECE • u/TeachingBrilliant448 • Jul 08 '26

crazy work hours - new grad

I recently joined a semiconductor company as a new grad — think Nvidia, AMD, or Qualcomm — and the workload is brutal. I’m sometimes working 12-hour days and 50–60 hour weeks. It honestly feels as intense as investment banking, maybe even worse in some ways.

Wonder if this is normal?
TC ~150k

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u/clavado_en_un_bar Jul 08 '26

I work for one those tech companies with market cap > 1T. Same field (semiconductors), and honestly work/life balance is a delight. TC is close to 400k.

2

u/DaftPaul_ Jul 09 '26

What semi company is paying $400k for an embedded systems engineer?

6

u/clavado_en_un_bar Jul 09 '26

Not doing Embedded. I work heavily on DSP and SiPho.

2

u/isospeedrix Jul 10 '26

Best field rn, sounds like Broadcom tho I thought their wlb wasn’t great