Staff Software Engineer - Hosting Services

Airbnb; City Of London; On-site; GBP 120,000 - 150,000; Full time

Job summary

Airbnb in London is seeking a Staff Software Engineer to shape the technical foundations for hosting services. You will be a hands-on leader, influencing product strategy and driving scalable architecture across the stack.

You’ll collaborate with product, design and data teams, own major systems end-to-end and mentor engineers to deliver high-impact features for Hosts and guests alike.

Qualifications

• 9+ years of software engineering experience.
• Strong backend engineering expertise.
• Proven experience building customer-facing products from zero to one.
• End-to-end product ownership.
• Broad full-stack capability across backend, frontend, mobile and APIs.
• Strong architectural design skills.
• Product-first engineering mindset.

Responsibilities

• Lead the technical design and development of new products and integrations.
• Define and shape the future state of major systems and services.
• Identify reusable patterns and tooling to accelerate invention.
• Own the full product lifecycle from discovery to launch.
• Collaborate with product, design and business stakeholders.
• Guide engineers in making sound architectural decisions.

Skills

Backend engineering

Distributed systems

APIs

Full-stack

Product leadership

Architectural design

Technical judgment

Job description

Airbnb was born in 2007 when two hosts welcomed three guests to their San Francisco home, and has since grown to over 5 million hosts who have welcomed over 2 billion guest arrivals in almost every country across the globe. Every day, hosts offer unique stays and experiences that make it possible for guests to connect with communities in a more authentic way.

The Community You Will Join

What if you could help shape the next generation of services that make hosting on Airbnb easier, smarter and more rewarding?

At Airbnb, we're expanding beyond our core platform to create new products, partnerships and services that unlock opportunities for Hosts and introduce entirely new business lines.

Our Hosting Services engineering team is entering an exciting phase of growth, with ambitious plans to accelerate the development of new products and third-party integrations. We're looking for a Staff Software Engineer who can help us turn that ambition into reality.

This is an opportunity to shape technical direction, build products from the ground up and rethink how we scale engineering innovation. You'll join an ambitious London-based engineering team, collaborating closely with colleagues in the US, with the autonomy to challenge ideas, influence strategy and create meaningful impact.

If you're excited by solving complex problems, building products people genuinely want to use and turning bold ideas into scalable businesses, we'd love to hear from you.

The Difference You Will Make

As a Staff Software Engineer in Hosting Services, you'll play a pivotal role in defining and delivering the technical foundations for Airbnb's expanding ecosystem of Host services.

This is more than an architectural leadership role. You'll be a hands-on technical leader, product thinker and strategic partner, helping take new ideas from concept to launch, then continuously improving them to deliver meaningful customer and business outcomes.

You'll work across engineering, product, design and business teams to shape what we build, how we build it and how we scale our ability to innovate.

Your Expertise

We're looking for an experienced, product-oriented engineer who combines deep technical expertise with the curiosity, ambition and leadership to build what's next.

Your impact will include:

• Build new products from zero to one: Lead the technical design and development of new customer-facing products, services and third-party integrations, helping create new business opportunities for Airbnb.
• Shape technical strategy and architecture: Define the future state of major systems and services, designing flexible, reliable and scalable solutions that balance immediate product needs with long-term technical quality.
• Accelerate engineering innovation: Identify new approaches, reusable patterns, tooling and AI-enabled development opportunities that allow engineering teams to deliver more products and integrations without proportionally increasing complexity or resources.
• Own the full product lifecycle: Partner with product and design teams from early discovery and ideation through development, launch, iteration and product-market fit, ensuring solutions deliver measurable value to Hosts and the business.
• Lead across the technology stack: Apply your expertise across backend systems, APIs, frontend, mobile and distributed architecture, remaining hands-on where needed to solve complex engineering challenges.
• Drive technical excellence: Guide engineers across teams in making sound architectural decisions, navigating technical trade-offs and maintaining high standards of reliability, performance, efficiency and user experience.
• Influence beyond your immediate team: Collaborate with engineering, product, UX, data science, data engineering and business stakeholders to align technical decisions with broader product and commercial objectives.
• Challenge what's possible: Bring fresh thinking, question existing approaches and proactively identify opportunities to build better products, move faster and expand the impact of our engineering organisation.

Technical Experience & Capabilities

• 9+ years of software engineering experience, ideally within fast-paced, product-led technology environments, with a track record of delivering complex, high-impact solutions.
• Strong backend engineering expertise, including designing and developing large-scale, service-oriented and distributed systems.
• Proven experience building customer-facing products from zero to one, contributing to product definition, technical architecture, development and launch.
• End-to-end product ownership, with experience iterating on launched products, responding to customer feedback and improving adoption, usability and business outcomes.
• Broad full-stack engineering capability, with the confidence to work across backend, frontend, mobile, APIs and system architecture as technical challenges require.
• Strong architectural design skills, including high-scale distributed services, well-designed APIs, data pipelines, efficient algorithms and reliable integrations.
• Sound technical judgment, with the ability to balance speed of delivery, experimentation, scalability and long-term engineering quality.
• A product-first engineering mindset, with an understanding that technical

Our Commitment To Inclusion & Belonging

Airbnb is committed to working with the broadest talent pool possible. We believe diverse ideas foster innovation and engagement, and allow us to attract creatively-led people, and to develop the best products, services and solutions. All qualified individuals are encouraged to apply.

How We'll Take Care of You

Our job titles may span more than one career level. The actual base pay is dependent upon many factors, such as: training, transferable skills, work experience, business needs and market demands. The base pay range shown below is annualized, is subject to change and may be modified in the future. This role may also be eligible for bonus, equity, benefits, and Employee Travel Credits.

United Kingdom Annual Pay Range

£120,000-£150,000 GBP

Reasonable Accommodations: We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations throughout the recruitment process for applicants with disabilities. If you need assistance, or an accommodation, please let your recruiter know once you are contacted about a role.