Product Engineer

usekernel; San Francisco (CA); Hybrid; USD 150,000 - 210,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Industry-competitive salary

Above market equity

Premium medical + dental coverage + de

Dependent coverage

Small, trusting team of senior + staff

Async without heavy meetings

$1k/mo for LLM usage fees

Daily lunches

Unlimited PTO

401k + company match

Relocation assistance

Job summary

Kernel is a fast, open source browser infrastructure for AI agents. We build the platform that powers autoscaling, observability, and web interactions for developers building agent-powered apps in San Francisco.

As a Product Engineer, you’ll translate product instincts into code, ship full-stack features end-to-end, and help shape the roadmap with a strong focus on developer experience. Expect collaboration with co-founders and a culture of rapid iteration.

Qualifications

• Customer-outcome focus and metric-driven approach.
• End-to-end ownership of features from frontend to backend.
• Strong product intuition for developer tools and APIs.
• Startup experience and ability to wear many hats.

Responsibilities

• Own customer outcomes and product metrics.
• Implement full-stack user-facing surfaces including core product and new lines.
• Shape product roadmap from customer feedback and usage patterns.
• Drive developer experience improvements across SDKs, docs, CLI, and API.

Job description

About Kernel

Kernel is crazy fast, open source browser infrastructure for AI agents. We handle autoscaling, observability, and the messy details of web interaction, so developers can focus on what their agents do instead of how they do it.

Teams at Cash App, Rye, and 3000+ others use Kernel for deep research, QA automation, and real-time web analysis. We've raised $22M from Accel, YC, and Vercel.

If you're interested in building critical infrastructure for agents on the web, we'd love to chat.

About the role

Product Engineers at Kernel are full-stack engineers who think about the product as much as the code. You know how to translate your strong product instincts into code, from pixel-level UI decisions to backend API design. You don't wait for a spec, you help write it.

You’ll work closely with our co-founders to set product direction, ship full-stack features end-to-end, and make Kernel feel as polished as it is powerful.

What you’ll do

• Own customer outcomes and product metrics

• Execute the full-stack implementation of user-facing product surfaces, including our core product and new product lines

• Shape the product roadmap by synthesizing customer feedback, usage patterns, and your own instincts about what developers need

• Drive DX improvements across our SDK, docs, CLI, and API. The kind of details that make developers say "this just works"

• Ship fast and iterate, from prototype to production with minimal hand-holding

• Help define what it means to build a great developer product at Kernel

What we’re looking for

• You’re driven by customer outcomes: you’re empathetic to customers, naturally inclined to help them succeed in their goals through KERNEL, and obsessed with metrics that matter to them

• You ship end-to-end: you’re comfortable owning a feature from frontend to backend and getting it across the finish line

• You have product taste: you’ve thought hard about what makes developer tools feel magical vs. frustrating, and that thinking shows up in your work

• Startup experience: you’ve built fast, worn multiple hats, and figured things out without a playbook

• You build for developers deploying agents into the real world

• You have strong opinions about devEx and API design, and you know how to back them up with shipped work

What you can expect as a Kernel

• Industry-competitive salary

• Above market equity

• Premium medical + dental coverage + dependent coverage

• Small, trusting team of senior + staff engineers

• Default async with minimal bureaucracy, only two meetings a week

• $1k / mo budget for LLM usage fees #vibecheck

• Daily lunches on us

• Unlimited PTO

• 401k + company match

• Relocation assistance

Hiring process

We have a simple process focused on real world collaboration and jointly getting to know each other:

1. 30-minute intro call with one of Kernel’s co-founders

2. 45-minute technical interview (virtual)

3. Half-day on-site (virtual or in-person) working with our team on relevant challenges.

4. Offer!