Principal Software Engineer, Backend – Sharing

Roblox; San Mateo (CA); On-site; USD 295,000 - 345,000; Full time

Job summary

Roblox is seeking a Principal Software Engineer on the Sharing team in San Mateo, CA to lead multi-team initiatives with a long-term technical vision and group-wide impact. You will define platform strategy, mentor senior engineers, and set engineering standards to advance scalable content sharing.

Based in San Mateo, CA, this role offers a competitive base salary, equity, and benefits. You will collaborate across teams to build reliable infrastructure, scalable APIs, and high-throughput

Qualifications

• 8+ years of experience building large-scale backend systems.
• Deep experience designing distributed systems, scalable APIs, and high-throughput backend services.
• Experience on consumer-facing platforms at scale with millions of users.
• Proven track record leading large, multi-team initiatives with long-term technical vision.
• Experience acting as an escalation point for production or infrastructure incidents and defining technical investment strategies.
• Excellent communication across audiences to enable sound decisions and collaboration.
• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related field, or equivalent practical experience.

Responsibilities

• Own the outcome of complex, multi-team programs spanning several teams and years.
• Develop and drive a multi-year technical vision for content creation and sharing.
• Lead high-severity incident response and drive durable systemic solutions.
• Regularly improve shared infrastructure and foundational systems.
• Align multiple teams on technical direction, with detailed design docs and roadmaps.
• Mentor and cultivate engineering talent across the group.

Skills

Backend development

System design

Distributed systems

Leadership

Operational excellence

Communication

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related field

Job description

Every day, tens of millions of people come to Roblox to explore, create, play, learn, and connect with friends in 3D immersive digital experiences– all created by our global community of developers and creators.

At Roblox, we’re building the tools and platform that empower our community to bring any experience that they can imagine to life. Our vision is to reimagine the way people come together, from anywhere in the world, and on any device.We’re on a mission to connect a billion people with optimism and civility, and looking for amazing talent to help us get there.

A career at Roblox means you’ll be working to shape the future of human interaction, solving unique technical challenges at scale, and helping to create safer, more civil shared experiences for everyone.

As a Principal Software Engineer on the Sharing team, you will lead large, multi-team initiatives with long-term technical vision and group-level impact. You will be expected to define and drive the platform-wide strategy powering how millions of users capture, share, and discover content on Roblox. In this role, you will set engineering standards, mentor senior engineers, and serve as a key architect of our long-term technical direction.

You Will

• Drive Strategy & Execution: Own the outcome of complex, business-critical programs spanning several teams, often lasting years.
• Innovate at Scale: Develop and drive a multi-year technical vision for content creation and sharing, anticipating scale, technology, and business evolution.
• Elevate Reliability: Lead high-severity incident response across groups; drive durable systemic solutions that improve reliability and velocity.
• Architect Foundations: Regularly improve shared infrastructure and foundational systems, introducing frameworks that uplift development speed across the organization.
• Align Teams: Aligns multiple teams on shared technical direction, producing detailed design docs, phased roadmaps, and planning models that balance short and long-term goals.
• Cultivate Talent: Shape hiring, closing, and retention of top talent, and lead engineering excellence and quality initiatives across your group while mentoring senior engineers.

You Have

• Technical Foundation: 8 years of experience building large-scale backend systems in C , C#, Java, or similar languages.
• System Design Expertise: Deep experience designing distributed systems, scalable APIs, and high-throughput backend services.
• Consumer Scale: Experience working on consumer-facing platforms at scale with millions of users.
• Proven Leadership: A demonstrated track record of leading large, multi-team initiatives with long-term technical vision and group-level impact.
• Operational Excellence: Experience acting as an escalation point for the hardest production or infrastructure incidents, and a history of defining technical investment strategies with senior leadership.
• Exceptional Communication: The ability to communicate effectively across audiences to enable sound decisions and model inclusive, respectful collaboration.
• Education: A Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.

For roles that are based at our headquarters in San Mateo, CA: The starting base pay for this position is as shown below. The actual base pay is dependent upon a variety of job-related factors such as professional background, training, work experience, location, business needs and market demand. Therefore, in some circumstances, the actual salary could fall outside of this expected range. This pay range is subject to change and may be modified in the future. All full-time employees are also eligible for equity compensation and for benefits as described on this page.
Annual Salary Range
$295,250—$345,040 USD
Roles that are based in an office are onsite Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, with optional presence on Monday and Friday (unless otherwise noted).

Roblox provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws. Roblox also provides reasonable accommodations to candidates with qualifying disabilities or religious beliefs during the recruiting process.

For US based roles only, please note the Company may not be able to employ candidates for this role who have United States work authorization related to certain U.S. visa categories, or support future H-1B sponsorship at this time.