Which is a better company to work for as SWE with same TC ~300k

In general I’d say Apple, but because you mentioned backend and distributed system not sure. Depends on the org

Airbnb for sure, don’t be blinded by the big brand names, TC and culture is far superior.

Isn't airbnb the biggest name in the list?

Not from a brand perspective compared to Amazon and Apple but in most other ways, yes

Gotcha, you mean consumer/product brand. I meant engineering brand.

Airbnb or Amazon. With apple you'll never be able to talk about what you work on. It will hurt future mobility outside Apple. Avoid lyft and pinterest.

Back end and distributed systems would cause me to choose Amazon or Pinterest. The other companies are all great but I'd optimize for working on interesting problems in your domain.