This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 16th International Symposium on Search-Based Software Engineering, SSBSE 2024, held in Porto de Galinhas, Brazil, during July 2024. The 8 papers included in these proceedings were carefully reviewed and selected from 19 submissions. The papers deal with various aspects and applications of search-based software engineering, focusing on engineering challenges and the application of automated approaches and optimization techniques from AI and machine learning research.