Staff Software Engineer, Consumer Engineering

Socket.dev; United States; On-site; USD 217,000 - 303,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical insurance

Dental insurance

Vision insurance

401(k) match

Generous time off

Parental leave

Equity eligibility

Job summary

Reddit Consumer Engineering is hiring Product Backend Engineers to build and scale features for hundreds of millions of users by partnering with Product Management, Design, Data Science, ML, and Frontend teams. You will drive end-to-end delivery and own APIs, data pipelines, and system performance.

The role emphasizes data-informed engineering, architectural rigor, and modern tooling with a strong focus on velocity and reliability.

Qualifications

• 7+ years of hands-on backend development in distributed systems.
• Experience building and operating large-scale services.
• Proficient in designing scalable APIs and data stores.
• Strong collaboration with product/design/data science teams.
• Familiarity with modern tooling and AI-assisted workflows.

Responsibilities

• Partner with Product, Design, Data Science, ML, and Client Engineers to translate needs into reliable, low-latency solutions.
• Own end-to-end delivery from design docs to rollout and observability.
• Design, build, and evaluate A/B experiments using data tools to inform decisions.
• Build and maintain scalable APIs (GraphQL, REST, gRPC) and backend services.
• Establish engineering best practices and mentor teammates.

Skills

Backend development

Distributed systems

Data-informed decision making

Cross-functional collaboration

Performance optimization

Tools

Redis

Cassandra

PostgreSQL

GraphQL

REST

gRPC

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.

The Reddit Consumer Engineering organization builds and scales the products that Redditors use directly to discover content, participate in communities, and connect with others. Sitting at the intersection of large-scale distributed systems and core user journeys, Product Backend Engineers in Consumer Engineering partner directly with Product Managers, Designers, Data Scientists, ML Engineers, and Frontend Engineers to build, experiment with, and scale features that power how hundreds of millions of users discover, join, navigate, and engage with Reddit.

This centralized role hires across several high-impact consumer teams, including:

• Core Product & Feeds: Home Experience, Recommendations & Content Discovery, Content Contribution
• Community & Presence: Reddit Pro, Youth Experience & Teen Safety, Creator Tools
• Growth & Engagement: Authentication, Notifications, Social Sharing, SEO, Onboarding.
• Monetization & Conversion: Paid User Acquisition, Conversion Funnel Optimization
• Identity & Security: Account Management, Trust & Safety

What You’ll Do

• Cross-Functional Product Architecture: Partner closely with Product Management, Product Design, Data Science, and Client Engineers (iOS/Android/Web) to translate business and user needs into reliable, low-latency technical solutions.
• End-to-End Delivery: Own the full software lifecycle for major product initiatives from technical design docs and API contracts to development, testing, rollout, and observability.
• Metrics & Experimentation-Led Engineering: Design, build, and evaluate A/B experiments. Work with tools like BigQuery, HEX, or Firebase to analyze user behavior, conversion funnels, and retention loops to make data-backed engineering decisions.
• API & System Performance: Build and maintain scalable APIs (GraphQL, REST, gRPC) and distributed backend services optimized for client consumption and consumer UI performance.
• Technical Rigor & Modern Tooling: Establish engineering best practices, improve developer workflows, mentor teammates, and use modern, AI-integrated tools to ship high-quality products efficiently.

Who You Are

• User-Centric Mindset: An advocate for the user with an intuitive feel for product usability, interaction design, social dynamics, and user growth loops. You care deeply about why a feature is being built and its impact on the end user.
• Data-Informed & Hypothesis-Driven: Comfortable working alongside Data Scientists and PMs to design experiments, establish core performance metrics, and iterate quickly based on real-time feedback.
• Technical Rigor at Scale: 7+ years of hands-on backend development experience building and operating large-scale distributed serving systems in high-concurrency environments.
• Bias for Action: Self-directed, innovative, and comfortable navigating ambiguity in fast-paced product environments where balancing velocity with system reliability is essential.
• Collaborative Communicator: Outstanding communication skills with a track record of driving cross-functional alignment in fully remote or hybrid team environments.

Technical Qualifications

• Languages: Proficiency in modern backend languages such as Go or Python (or Java, Kotlin, Rust, C++).
• API Design: Expertise in designing and maintaining scalable, maintainable APIs using GraphQL, REST, or gRPC for native mobile and web applications.
• Data & Caching: Experience with high-throughput caching layers and distributed datastores (e.g., Redis, Cassandra, PostgreSQL).
• Modern Workflows: Experience or interest in using AI-assisted engineering tools to accelerate development workflows.

Pay Transparency:

This job posting may span more than one career level.

In addition to base salary, this job is eligible to receive equity in the form of restricted stock units, and depending on the position offered, it may also be eligible to receive a commission. Additionally, Reddit offers a wide range of benefits to U.S.-based employees, including medical, dental, and vision insurance, 401(k) program with employer match, generous time off for vacation, and parental leave. To learn more, please visit https://www.redditinc.com/careers/.

To provide greater transparency to candidates, we share base salary ranges for all US-based job postings regardless of state. We set standard base pay ranges for all roles based on function, level, and country location, benchmarked against similar stage growth companies. Final offer amounts are determined by multiple factors including, skills, depth of work experience and relevant licenses/credentials, and may vary from the amounts listed below.

The base salary range for this position is: $217,000 — $303,000 USD

In select roles and locations, the interviews will be recorded, transcribed and summarized by artificial intelligence (AI). You will have the opportunity to opt out of recording, transcription and summarization prior to any scheduled interviews.

During the interview, we will collect the following categories of personal information: Identifiers, Professional and Employment-Related Information, Sensory Information (audio/video recording), and any other categories of personal information you choose to share with us. We will use this information to evaluate your application for employment or an independent contractor role, as applicable. We will not sell your personal information or disclose it to any third party for their marketing purposes. We will delete any recording of your interview promptly after making a hiring decision. For more information about how we will handle your personal information, including our retention of it, please refer to our Candidate Privacy Policy for Potential Employees and Contractors.

Reddit is proud to be an equal opportunity employer, and is committed to building a workforce representative of the diverse communities we serve. Reddit is committed to providing reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities and disabled veterans in our job application procedures. If, due to a disability, you need an accommodation during the interview process, please let your recruiter know.