Senior Software Engineer, Media Experience

EngineersOfAI; Northern (KY); Hybrid; USD 130,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

Reddit is seeking a Senior Software Engineer to shape the next version of our media infrastructure, defining work on how we ingest, process, store, and deliver video and audio content globally.

You will collaborate across product, design, and engineering teams, participate in the full development cycle, and mentor peers to raise technical excellence. The role emphasizes remote collaboration and fast-paced delivery.

Qualifications

• BS degree in Computer Science or equivalent practical experience.
• 3+ years of industry experience in large-scale distributed systems.
• 5+ years of hands-on software development experience in Go, Python, Ruby, Java, or C++.
• Experience with GraphQL, REST, HTTP, gRPC, and Thrift basics; ability to design maintainable APIs.
• Experience with Redis and distributed caching.
• Familiarity with image processing and delivery technologies (image scaling, cropping, progressive JPEG, WebP).
• Familiarity with streaming protocols (HLS, DASH, MP4) and codecs (H.264, H.265/HEVC, VP9, AV1).
• Strong organizational and communication skills; able to work in a fully remote environment.

Responsibilities

• Collaborate cross-functionally with product, design, and engineering to build features aligned with product strategy.
• Contribute to full development cycle from design to launch; review code and design docs.
• Mentor junior engineers and help improve developer workflows and best practices.
• Balance speed and quality to build new products quickly while maintaining reliability.
• Collaborate with client and platform engineers to improve media performance globally.

Skills

Go

Python

Ruby

Java

C++

Distributed systems

Team collaboration

Communication

Education

BS degree in Computer Science

Tools

GraphQL

REST

HTTP

gRPC

Thrift

Redis

FFMPEG

GPAC

AV1

Job description

Reddit is a community of communities. It's built on shared interests, passion, and trust, and is home to the most open and authentic conversations on the internet. Every day, Reddit users submit, vote, and comment on the topics they care most about. With 100,000+ active communities and approximately 130 million daily active unique visitors, Reddit is one of the internet’s largest sources of information. For more information, visit www.redditinc.com.

We are seeking a Senior Software Engineer to help us build the next version of our media infrastructure. In this role, you will define the work on the technical components of how we ingest, process, store, and deliver video and audio content at Reddit. You will tackle complex technical challenges to support our media product strategy and deliver high-quality media experiences globally.

Key Responsibilities

• Work cross-functionally with product, design, and other engineering counterparts to execute on product and business strategy and build novel products and features that our users will love.
• Contribute to the full development cycle: technical design, development, test, experimentation, analysis, and launch. You’ll be reviewing code and design docs, giving feedback on product specs and mocks.
• Participate with a team of thoughtful, fast-moving, and motivated engineers. Contribute to standards that improve developer workflows, recommend best practices, and help mentor junior engineers on the team to grow their technical expertise.
• Move fast while balancing quality. We can’t afford extensive processes, and we also can’t afford show-stopping bugs. We need someone who can balance speed with quality while quickly building brand-new products.
• Collaborate with client engineers and platform engineers to improve performance of media across Reddit to serve better content globally.

Qualifications

• BS degree in Computer Science, a similar technical field of study or equivalent practical experience
• 3+ years of industry experience in large-scale distributed systems.
• 5+ years of hands-on, professional software development experience in one or more general purpose programming languages (Go, Python, Ruby, Java, C++)
• Experienced with GraphQL, REST, HTTP, gRPC, Thrift basics, and the ability to design and implement maintainable APIs
• Experienced with distributed caching layers, and distributed large scale data storage systems like Redis.
• Familiarity with image processing and delivery technologies such as image scaling, cropping, and image formats like progressive JPEG, WebP, etc.
• Familiarity with HTTP Live Streaming (HLS), MPEG-DASH, MP4, and other streaming protocols, as well as video compression standards (H.264, H.265/HEVC, VP9, AV1)
• Strong organizational skills, the ability to prioritize tasks and to deliver projects on schedule.
• Excellent communication skills. You collaborate effectively with teams in a fully remote environment and discuss complex topics with technical and non-technical audiences.

What Will Set You Apart

• Demonstrated curiosity and commitment to staying up-to‑date with advancements in video compression technologies, including attending conferences, reading research papers, and engaging with the latest industry trends.
• Strong understanding of how to measure and improve video visual quality metrics (eg., VMAF, PSNR)
• Hands-on expertise with tools like FFMPEG, GPAC and similar media frameworks for processing, modifying, and manipulating media streams.
• Experienced with client-side technologies, familiarly with the client library around media (eg., AVF