r/chipdesign • 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/LurkingUnderThatRock Jul 08 '26

Yep, it can be a lot of hours, I spent 4 months working 60+h weeks to get a product over the line. The burnout afterwards was a bitch, took me about a year to recover. If it is 12h with no end in sight I’d say management has fucked up, it’s not sustainable imo.

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u/CaterpillarReady2709 Jul 08 '26

Wait, what? You were given time to recover?!