Design Systems Product Designer

Instagram LLC; San Francisco (CA); Hybrid; USD 201,000 - 278,000; Full time

Job summary

Instagram LLC is seeking a Senior Product Designer to lead the vision and strategic direction for Instagram Design Systems. You will shape component libraries, spec-to-code alignment, and AI-powered tooling across iOS, Android, and web.

The role demands deep systems thinking, craft, and influence across designers, engineers, and product managers to raise on-system quality at scale.

Qualifications

• 10+ years of product design experience driving design system initiatives at consumer scale
• Portfolio demonstrating exceptional systems thinking and craft across component design, pattern libraries, or design tooling
• Experience designing for large-scale consumer products with cross-platform consistency
• Proven ability to partner with engineering on APIs, code architecture, and spec-to-code alignment
• Comfort with AI-native workflows and tooling and machine-readable design knowledge

Responsibilities

• Identify, shape, and drive critical initiatives for Instagram's Design System.
• Design scalable, composable component systems across surfaces, platforms, and contexts including AI-assembled UI.
• Close the gap between design spec and shipped code with robust frameworks and processes.
• Evolve the AI knowledge layer for on-system, high-quality output.
• Influence adoption and lead cross-functional teams to expand on-system patterns.

Skills

Systems thinking

Cross-functional leadership

Design systems

AI-native tooling

Product design

Education

Strong portfolio showing systems thinking

Tools

Figma

Design tokens

Job description

# Design Systems Product DesignerSan Francisco, CAWe're looking for a senior Product Designer to help set the vision and strategic direction for Instagram Design Systems — the system that ensures craft scales with Instagram. Our system is the connective tissue that ensures quality across every surface.This role sits at the intersection of design craft, systems architecture, platform engineering, and AI-native tooling. You'll drive the strategic direction of how Instagram's design system evolves — identifying new opportunities, shaping the roadmap, and driving initiatives from vision through execution across component design, documentation, and AI knowledge layers. The work spans component libraries, spec-to-code alignment, design tooling, and cross-platform standards (iOS, Android, iPad, foldables) — requiring someone who can set direction for systematic quality end-to-end while navigating the organizational and technical complexity of shipping at Instagram's scale.You'll be a recognized leader not just within design, but across the product group — driving execution, culture, and process on a cross-functional team of designers, engineers, and product managers. You'll influence product design teams across Instagram to drive adoption, shape what's on-system vs. bespoke, and ensure the system flexes to serve both today's UI patterns and tomorrow's AI-generated experiences. The ideal candidate has deep systems thinking, exceptional craft sensibilities, a strong point of view on scalable design architecture, and the ability to identify new opportunities, influence senior stakeholders, and drive initiatives that wouldn't happen without them.## Responsibilities* Identify, shape, and drive critical initiatives for Instagram's Design System. You'll spot gaps and opportunities that others miss — defining new strategic bets like component expansion, spec-to-code alignment, or AI-native tooling — and drive them from vision through execution with quality and coherence.* Design scalable, composable component systems. You'll lead the design of components that flex across surfaces, platforms, and contexts including AI-assembled UI. This includes defining motion language, interaction behaviors, and componentry that feel cohesive end-to-end.* Close and maintain the gap between design spec and shipped code. You'll create the frameworks and processes that keep design and engineering in sync by default so drift doesn't recur, and what designers spec is what gets built.* Evolve the AI knowledge layer. You'll help keep our AI-powered designer, reviewer, and prototyper agents current and accurate, expanding coverage across surface areas so every agent interaction produces on-system, high-quality output.* Hold the craft bar for systematic design across your workstreams. You'll ensure every component, pattern, and guideline reflects Instagram's premium quality standard across iOS, Android, iPad, and foldables. You'll make \"on-system\" feel better than bespoke, not like a compromise.* Drive adoption through influence and organizational leadership. You'll work directly with designers and leadership across Instagram to expand coverage, convert deprecated patterns, and build genuine organizational pull toward on-system building, shaping how teams think about quality and consistency, not just what they build.* Build out new patterns in partnership with product teams. You'll work with teams across Instagram to co-create patterns that serve real product needs, turning recurring design problems into reusable, on-system solutions that raise quality across surfaces.* Contribute to design tooling and workflow improvements that accelerate on-system work. You'll help shape tools and invest in improving design workflows end-to-end through library management and templates). You'll ensure tooling connects to the system and makes on-system design the fastest path.* Build measurement approaches that demonstrate system value. You'll partner with data and engineering to understand system coverage, adoption, and quality.* Shape product group direction beyond design. You'll operate as a leader across the broader product group to influence engineering architecture decisions, product priorities, and resource allocation.* You'll lobby for new ideas, navigate organizational complexity, and use your deep institutional knowledge of how Meta builds products to get things done that few others can.## Minimum Qualifications* 10+ years of product design experience, with a proven track record of identifying and driving design system initiatives at consumer scale — including component libraries, design tokens, documentation, or governance You should have led (not just contributed to) systematic work that had broad organizational impact* A portfolio that demonstrates exceptional systems thinking and craft — showing work that spans component design, pattern libraries, cross-platform adaptation, or design tooling We want to see rigor and beauty* Deep experience designing for large-scale consumer products — ideally platforms where consistency across dozens of surfaces and hundreds of engineers is a real challenge You've been a recognized leader not just within design, but across a broader product group* Demonstrated ability to identify opportunities and design systems that scale — you've made decisions about abstraction, composability, and quality that held up to the complexity of real product development, and you drove those initiatives proactively rather than being handed them* Experience partnering closely with engineering on component APIs, code architecture, and spec-to-code alignment — you understand the translation layer between design intent and implementation* Comfort with AI-native workflows and tooling — either direct experience building systems for AI agents to consume, or strong intuition for how design knowledge needs to be structured for machine readability* Experience measuring design system adoption and quality — you've helped build the case for system investment through evidence, not just conviction* Cross-platform experience (iOS, Android, responsive) with an understanding of how platform design languages evolve and how systems accommodate that evolution — with particular familiarity with Android design patterns and development workflows* Coding experience is a plus — especially comfort working within token infrastructure, making refinements to design token values, naming, and semantic structures that engineering teams rarely have bandwidth for* A track record of investing in design workflow improvements — creating and maintaining Figma libraries, developing presentation decks, building documentation templates — that raise the quality and efficiency of the broader design team## Preferred Qualifications* Demonstrated ability to integrate AI tools to optimize/redesign workflows and drive measurable impact (e.g., efficiency gains, quality improvements)* Experience adhering to and implementing responsible, ethical AI practices (e.g., risk assessment, bias mitigation, quality and accuracy reviews)* Demonstrated ongoing AI skill development (e.g., prompt/context engineering, agent orchestration) and staying current with emerging AI technologies## Compensation$201,000/year to $278,000/year + bonus + equity + benefits