Software Engineer III, Copilot Models Inference

GitHub, Inc.; United States; Hybrid; USD 108,000 - 286,000; Full time

Job summary

GitHub, Inc. is seeking a Software Engineer III to design, implement, and operate backend services and APIs that connect Copilot experiences to AI model providers.

You will own features end-to-end, work with cross-functional teams, and help scale services for global usage. You will join a distributed, diverse team and contribute to production features with a focus on reliability, performance, and safe rollout practices.

Qualifications

• 4+ years experience delivering production software
• Experience with relational and NoSQL databases is a plus
• Experience with cloud-native services and containers
• Experience with AI or LLM inference systems is a plus
• Observability and reliability engineering experience is desirable
• Canary releases and progressive delivery experience valued

Responsibilities

• Design, implement, test, deploy, and maintain backend services and APIs
• Own features end-to-end from design to rollout
• Improve latency, capacity, and high-availability
• Write tests, dashboards, alerts, and runbooks
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams across lifecycle stages
• Participate in code reviews and design discussions
• Contribute to on-call rotations and incident response
• Use progressive delivery to minimize rollout risk
• Coordinate with partners to improve model availability

Skills

Software engineering

Distributed systems

Code reviews

Education

Bachelor’s or higher in CS/Engineering

Associate's degree +3 yrs

Master’s degree in CS/Engineering

Equivalent experience

Tools

Docker

Kubernetes

Cloud platforms

Job description

About GitHub

GitHub is the world’s leading platform for agentic software development — powered by Copilot to build, scale, and deliver secure software. Over 180 million developers, including more than 90% of the Fortune 100 companies, use GitHub to collaborate, and more than 77,000 organisations have adopted GitHub Copilot.

Locations

In this role you can work from Remote, United States

Overview

As a software engineer at GitHub, you will enhance the collaboration experience at GitHub by working closely with a community of engineers and designers with a distributed, diverse and passionate team delivering the services that millions of developers depend on. In this role you will design, prototype, implement, ship and support highly performant and inspiring user experiences with your team.

The GitHub Copilot Models Inference team builds and operates the backend services and APIs that connect Copilot experiences to AI model providers. These systems make models available safely and reliably at global scale while managing the production realities of provider integrations, request routing, service health, latency, capacity, and changing model availability.

As a Software Engineer III, you will deliver production features end to end and help operate the services you change. You will participate in design and code reviews, build tests and operational safeguards, prepare changes for rollout, and use production signals to improve reliability and performance. Clear communication matters on this distributed team. You will work with engineers and partners across Models Lifecycle, product, safety, infrastructure, and external model providers through a mix of live conversations and thoughtful written updates. This is a hands‑on individual contributor role with opportunities to grow ownership through increasingly independent delivery.

Responsibilities

• Design, implement, test, deploy, and maintain backend services and APIs that connect GitHub Copilot experiences to model providers.
• Own scoped features end to end, from technical design and implementationthrough operational readiness, safe rollout, measurement, and follow-up.
• Integrate new models and provider capabilities while accounting for availability,compatibility, capacity, failure modes, and safe fallback behavior.
• Improve service latency, throughput, capacity efficiency, and high‑availability behavior using measurable production outcomes.
• Add and maintain automated tests, dashboards, alerts, runbooks, and diagnostics that make service and model health understandable and actionable
• Keep teammates and partners informed through clear discussions, written updates, and documentation, especially when decisions, risks, or incidents affect others.
• Participate in code reviews and design discussions, incorporating feedback and helping teammates ship maintainable changes.
• Participate in on‑call and first‑responder rotations, investigate incidents, communicate impact, restore service, and complete appropriate repair and automation work.
• Use progressive delivery practices and production evidence to reduce risk when launching models, changing routing behavior, or updating provider integrations.
• Collaborate with Models Lifecycle, product, safety, infrastructure, and provider partners to deliver model availability and operational improvements across team boundaries.

Qualifications

Required Qualifications:

• 4+ years experience in Software Engineering, Computer Science, or related technical discipline with proven experience maintaining and delivering production software languages including, but not limited to, C, C++, C#, JavaScript, Go, Ruby, Rust, or Python.

  • OR Associate’s Degree in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Electronics Engineering, Math, Physics, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or related field AND 3+ years experience.

  • OR Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Electronics Engineering, Math, Physics, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or related field AND 2+ years experience in Computer Science, or related technical discipline with proven experience coding in languages including, but not limited to, C, C++, C#, JavaScript, Go, Ruby, Rust, or Python.

  • OR Master’s Degree in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Electronics Engineering, Math, Physics, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, or related field.

  • OR equivalent experience

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience applying software design principles such as clear interfaces, useful abstractions, and composition to build maintainable and testable systems.
• Experience working with both relational databases and NoSQL data stores, including making appropriate data-modeling and access-pattern tradeoffs.
• Experience building or operating cloud-native services, including containers, Kubernetes, or managed cloud infrastructure.
• Experience with AI or large language model inference systems, model APIs, or model-provider integrations.
• Experience with observability and reliability engineering, including improving latency, capacity, resilience, or incident response for production services.
• Experience with canary releases, feature flags, progressive delivery, or other safe rollout practices.

Compensation Range

The base salary range for this job is USD $107,700.00 - USD $285,900.00 /Yr.

These pay ranges are intended to cover roles based across the United States. An individual's base pay depends on various factors including geographical location and review of experience, knowledge, skills, abilities of the applicant. At GitHub certain roles are eligible for benefits and additional rewards, including annual bonus and stock. These rewards are allocated based on individual impact in role. In addition, certain roles also have the opportunity to earn sales incentives based on revenue or utilization, depending on the terms of the plan and the employee's role.

This position will be open for a minimum of 3 days, with applications accepted on an ongoing basis until the position is filled.

GitHub values

• Customer-obsessed
• Ship to learn
• Growth mindset
• Own the outcome
• Better together
• Diverse and inclusive

Manager fundamentals

• Model
• Coach
• Care

Leadership principles

• Create clarity
• Generate energy
• Deliver success

Who We Are

GitHub is the world’s leading AI-powered developer platform with 150 million developers and counting. We’re also home to the biggest open‑source community on earth (and 99% of the world’s software has open‑source code in its DNA). Many of the apps and programs you use every day are built on GitHub.

Our teams are dreamers, doers, and pioneers, leading the way in AI, driving humanitarian efforts around the globe, and even sending open source to Mars (and beyond!).At GitHub, our goal is to create the space you need to do your best work. We’re remote‑first and offer competitive pay, generous learning and growth opportunities, and excellent benefits to support you, wherever you are—because we know that people flourish when they can work on their own terms.

Join us, and let’s change the world, together.

EEO Statement

GitHub is made up of people from a wide variety of backgrounds and lifestyles. We embrace diversity and invite applications from people of all walks of life. We don't discriminate against employees or applicants based on gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, race, religion, age, national origin, citizenship, disability, pregnancy status, veteran status, or any other differences. Also, if you have a disability, please let us know if there's any way we can make the interview process better for you; we're happy to accommodate!