Backend Software Engineer, Applied Foundations

Slope; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 100,000 - 150,000; Full time

Job summary

OpenAI is seeking a Backend Software Engineer in San Francisco, California, to design and implement services that power core products like ChatGPT. The ideal candidate has strong experience with distributed systems and backend technologies such as Go, Python, and Rust. Responsibilities include building resilient backend systems, improving performance, and collaborating with cross-functional teams. This role fosters innovation and requires a humble attitude to support team success while handling complex and scalable solutions.

Qualifications

• Strong experience with distributed systems, APIs, and backend languages (Go, Python, Rust, C++).
• Experience setting up and maintaining production backend services and data pipelines.
• Humble attitude and eagerness to help colleagues.

Responsibilities

• Architect, build, and improve scalable backend systems and APIs.
• Drive performance, reliability, and safety across distributed services.
• Implement data storage, retrieval, compute, and integration solutions.
• Participate in long‑term architectural planning and technical design reviews.
• Collaborate with cross‑functional teams to design solutions.

Skills

Experience with distributed systems

API development

Backend languages (e.g., Go, Python, Rust, C++)

Job description

About the Team

OpenAI’s Applications Engineering organization builds and operates the products (such as ChatGPT & Codex) that bring our cutting‑edge research to millions of users and developers worldwide.

The Applied Foundations team owns the core product and platform layers that make those experiences possible — from identity & access, to safety to payments & commerce across all of our apps. Our teams span product engineering, infrastructure, and safety, working together to deliver technology that is reliable, secure, and trusted at global scale.

About the Role

We’re hiring Backend Software Engineers to design and implement safe services and infrastructure that power our core products.

What You’ll Do

• Architect, build, and improve scalable backend systems and APIs.
• Drive performance, reliability, and safety across distributed services.
• Implement data storage, retrieval, compute, and integration solutions.
• Participate in long‑term architectural planning and technical design reviews.
• Collaborate with cross‑functional teams to design solutions that protect against and mitigate adversarial attacks without compromising user experience.

You Might Thrive Here If You:

• Have strong experience with distributed systems, APIs, and backend languages (e.g., Go, Python, Rust, C++).
• Have experience setting up and maintaining production backend services and data pipelines.
• Have a humble attitude, an eagerness to help your colleagues, and a desire to do whatever it takes to make the team succeed.
• Enjoy building resilient services that handle large scale and complexity.
• Are self‑directed and enjoy figuring out the best way to solve a particular problem.
• Own problems end‑to‑end, and are willing to pick up whatever knowledge you’re missing to get the job done.

Equal Opportunity Statement

We are an equal opportunity employer, and we do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, veteran status, disability, genetic information, or other applicable legally protected characteristic.