Senior Staff Engineer (Backend) Core Services Eng

Uber; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 267,000 - 297,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

401(k) plan

Equity award

Bonus program

Health benefits

In-office collaboration focus

Job summary

Uber in San Francisco is seeking a Senior Staff Backend Engineer to join the Core Services group, focusing on high-scale distributed systems and foundational service infrastructure. You will shape multi-year technical roadmaps and drive architectural standards that scale across Uber's products.

You will lead end-to-end platform systems, set guidelines, mentor engineers, and collaborate with product and platform leadership to deliver reliable, scalable backend services under extreme traffic

Qualifications

• 10+ years of industry experience architecting, building, and operating high-throughput backend services and distributed systems in production.
• Master’s or Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Mathematics, or a related field.
• Strong problem-solving skills, with deep expertise in distributed system design, multi-tenant architectures, and high-concurrency paradigms.
• Experience in applying caching strategies, event-driven patterns, database optimization, and high-availability design to solve large-scale real-world problems.
• Industry experience with modern backend programming languages (Go, Java, C++, Rust, or Python), asynchronous message platforms (Kafka), gRPC/REST APIs, and enterprise cloud/orchestration infrastructure.

Responsibilities

• Shape multi-year technical roadmap and architectural vision for the Core Services org.
• Design robust, highly available backend solutions that drive system efficiency and business reliability.
• Shape backend engineering culture, set org-wide architectural guidelines, and uplevel engineering talent across the organization.
• Be responsible for end-to-end platform systems—from architectural design and high-concurrency microservices to load testing, observability, and zero-downtime production rollouts.

Skills

Distributed systems

High concurrency

Go

Java

C++

Python

Kafka

gRPC/REST

Cloud / orchestration

Architecture design

Education

Master's or Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Mathematics

Tools

Kubernetes

Databases

Job description

We are looking for an experienced Senior Staff Backend Engineer to join the Core Services engineering organization. Core Services is Uber's shared engineering platform — the foundation that every Uber product is built on. Identity, Payments, Risk, Communications, Safety, FinTech, and more. They are the most technically ambitious systems at Uber, operating at a scale and complexity few engineers ever encounter.

When you join Core Services, you don't build for one team. You build the infrastructure every team depends on. A reliability improvement you ship today propagates across UberX, Uber for Teens, Eats, Freight, and every other product — simultaneously.

About the Role

We are seeking a seasoned Senior Staff Backend Engineer to join the Core Services Eng org, focusing on high-scale distributed systems, resilient platform architecture, and foundational service infrastructure. Core Services is central to Uber’s mission of providing fast, reliable, and scalable digital experiences. We focus on establishing industry-leading architectural standards, building shared backend platform components, and guaranteeing business continuity under extreme traffic demands. Our commitment to platform reliability and engineering excellence is essential to maintaining system stability for everyone who relies on Uber.

What You'll Do

• Work with product, platform, and engineering leadership to shape the multi-year technical roadmap, system abstractions, and architectural vision for the Core Services org.
• Leverage deep algorithmic and distributed systems knowledge to design robust, highly available backend solutions that drive system efficiency and business reliability.
• Shape backend engineering culture, set org-wide architectural guidelines, and uplevel engineering talent across the organization.
• Be responsible for end-to-end platform systems—from architectural design and high-concurrency microservices to load testing, observability, and zero-downtime production rollouts. Work across teams to productionize mission-critical platform solutions at scale.

Basic Qualifications

• 10+ years of industry experience architecting, building, and operating high-throughput backend services and distributed systems in production.
• Master’s or Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Mathematics, or a related field.
• Strong problem-solving skills, with deep expertise in distributed system design, multi-tenant architectures, and high-concurrency paradigms.
• Experience in applying caching strategies, event-driven patterns, database optimization, and high-availability design to solve large-scale real-world problems.
• Industry experience with modern backend programming languages (e.g., Go, Java, C++, Rust, or Python), asynchronous message platforms (e.g., Kafka), gRPC/REST APIs, and enterprise cloud/orchestration infrastructure.

Preferred Qualifications

• Advanced degree (Master’s or PhD) in Computer Science, Systems Engineering, or a related technical field.
• Experience leading zero-downtime platform migrations, multi-region active-active deployments, or global disaster recovery strategies at extreme scale.
• Deep domain knowledge in foundational core platforms (e.g., API Gateways, Service Mesh, Auth/Identity systems, or Event-Streaming platforms).

For San Francisco, CA-based roles: The base salary range for this role is USD $267,000 per year - USD $297,000 per year.

For Sunnyvale, CA-based roles: The base salary range for this role is USD $267,000 per year - USD $297,000 per year.

For all US locations, you will be eligible to participate in Uber's bonus program, and may be offered an equity award & other types of comp. All full-time employees are eligible to participate in a 401(k) plan. You will also be eligible for various benefits.

You may be eligible for bonuses, equity, and other compensation, as well as a range of benefits. Explore our benefits.

Offices remain key to collaboration and Uber's culture. Unless approved for full remote work, employees must spend at least 50% of their time in-office. Some roles, like those at greenlight hubs, require full-time in-office presence. Ask your Recruiter for details about this role's requirements.

Uber is proud to be an Equal Opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, race, color, religion, national origin, disability, protected Veteran status, age, or any other characteristic protected by law. We also consider qualified applicants regardless of criminal histories, consistent with legal requirements. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation, please let us know by completing this form.