WordPress Developer (Mid-Senior Level)

Discover Africa Safaris; Wes-Kaap; Hybrid; ZAR 300,000 - 400,000; Full time

Job summary

Join Discover Africa Safaris as a WordPress Developer, where you'll craft custom themes and plugins for luxury travel brands. Work in a collaborative environment focused on quality and growth, with opportunities for professional development and exploration of Africa. Enjoy benefits like paid leave, hybrid working, and a supportive team culture.

Benefits

20 days of paid annual leave

Paid sabbatical leave after 5 years

Extra paid birthday leave

Hybrid working opportunities

Discounted Africa travel rates

Qualifications

• 5+ years of professional WordPress development.
• Strong skills in PHP, JavaScript (ES6+), HTML5 and CSS3.
• Experience with multilingual, responsive, and accessible sites.

Responsibilities

• Architect, build and maintain PHP-based themes and plugins.
• Implement engaging UI animations with GSAP.
• Configure and troubleshoot WPML/TranslatePress.

Skills

PHP

JavaScript

HTML

CSS

Tools

WordPress

GSAP

ACF

Job description

Who You Are & How You Work

You build with intent. Whether it’s a bespoke theme, a custom plugin, or a perfectly timed GSAP animation, you write code that makes people feel something, and function that elevates form. You enjoy clarity in a brief, but thrive on the freedom to bring a solution to life your own way. You’re curious, detail-oriented, and happiest when working on purposeful projects with a team that values collaboration over ego.

You care deeply about clean code, beautiful interfaces, and delivering seamless, multilingual experiences that convert. You’re confident with PHP, JavaScript, HTML and CSS, and WordPress is your playground.

If this sounds like you, we’d love to talk.

About Us

Discover Africa Group is a team of innovative, experienced, and ambitious go-getters passionate about sharing Africa’s best with travellers from around the world.

Our Portfolio Includes

• Discover Africa Safaris: Bespoke luxury safari travel in Southern and East Africa.
• 4x4 Hire: Adventure 4x4 self-drive exploration.
• Drive South Africa: Africa’s leading rental car comparison and booking engine.
  
  

Our in-house digital marketing and development team operates as a dedicated "internal agency," bringing together permanent staff, contractors, and agencies to create high-quality products and campaigns for our core travel brands.

We embrace a Kaizen approach of continuous improvement, based on the idea that small, ongoing positive changes can reap significant improvements. This ensures that every project is customer-centric and aligned with our mission to make travellers’ dreams come true. By collaborating closely with our travel experts, we craft engaging, results-driven marketing that inspires and connects with our audience.

Our team culture is friendly, supportive, and professional—we value creativity, collaboration, and personal growth. Based in the northern suburbs of Cape Town, you might even enjoy a smoother commute, travelling against peak traffic.

Your Purpose

You’ll sit between our Tech Lead and Junior Developer, owning and executing high-impact WordPress projects. From building performant custom themes and plugins, to configuring multilingual sites, your code will shape the digital face of our luxury travel brands.

You’ll Thrive In This Role If You

• Crave autonomy and take pride in writing robust, readable code
• Stay ahead of WP trends, JS and front-end trends
• Care about both performance and polish—because users notice both
• Can juggle multiple languages on a site without breaking translation (WPML, TranslatePress, Polylang, etc.)
• Are energised by team collaboration, but confident working independently
  
  

Your Core Responsibilities

Custom Theme & Plugin Development

Architect, build and maintain PHP-based themes and plugins that scale.

Advanced Templating

Craft performant WP queries for complex CPTs, taxonomies and relationship fields.

Frontend Magic

Implement engaging UI animations with GSAP; optimise workflows with vanilla JS (no React/Vue required). We’re not big on jQuery.

CMS Configuration

Deep dive into ACF (fields, repeaters, flexible content), custom post types and Gutenberg blocks.

Multilingual Implementation

Configure and troubleshoot WPML/TranslatePress so that every language shines.

️ DevOps Awareness

Hands-on hosting basics (Linux, Nginx/Apache, CDNs), enough to know when to triage or ping Ops.

Collaboration & Agile Practices

Work within Kanban/Scrum boards (Jira), pair-program when it makes sense, review and approve pull requests.

AI-Enhanced Productivity

Use LLMs and AI-powered tools to speed up grunt work—yet able to code confidently without them.

Why You’ll Enjoy This

• No Unicorn Hunting: We’ve cut the fluff—this role is focused, achievable and tied directly to business impact. If you’re a WordPress guru, this position may be perfect for you.
• Growth Culture: Upskilling is encouraged—you decide if that’s attending a GSAP workshop or experimenting with headless WP.
• Collaborative Team: A seasoned Tech Lead, a hungry junior dev, and a handful of highly capable contractors mean you’ll always have someone to bounce ideas off.
• Flat team structure: No red tape and bureaucracy standing in the way of progress. We’re a tight-knit team and move quickly on good ideas.
• Highly supported projects: Do your best work, with seasoned professionals spanning brand, content, UX, UI, SEO etc., upstream of web development in the project lifecycle, and very hands-on senior leadership.
• Work-life balance: We discourage crunch and recognise that you are unlikely to deliver your best work whilst stressed or overworked.
  
  

Why Join Us?

At Discover Africa Group, We Believe That Our Team’s Passion And Dedication Deserve To Be Celebrated And Rewarded. Here’s What You Can Look Forward To

• 20 days of paid annual leave
• After 5 years, earn one extra annual paid leave day per year, up to a max of 25 days
• Extra paid birthday leave - because no one should work on their birthday!
• Paid sabbatical leave days without tapping into your annual leave, after 5 years of service
• Hybrid Working Opportunities with flexible working conditions
• A team led by actively engaged owners who encourage a caring and positive culture
• Working alongside a diverse and dedicated team of professionals who share your love for Africa.
• Africa travel at discounted rates, giving you the chance to explore and deepen your connection to the continent.
  
  

Who We’re Looking For

• 5+ years of professional WordPress development
• Strong skills in PHP, JavaScript (ES6+), HTML5 and CSS3
• Mastery of ACF, CPTs, WP_Query, and WordPress hooks
• Track record of building multilingual, responsive, accessible sites
• Experience collaborating in hybrid teams (3 days in-office in Cape Town)
• High autonomy and ownership—you know when to ask and when to execute
  
  

Bonus Points For

• GSAP or other animation libraries
• Tailwind CSS or utility-first frameworks
• Laravel or headless WP experience
• Basic AI/ML integrations in a web context
• Past work in luxury or travel industries
  
  

How to apply?

If you’re ready to push your WordPress powers into high gear, we’d love to hear from you. Apply today and include your GitHub and/or portfolio links, and a brief note on your proudest WP project.

Let’s build some incredible stuff!

Discover Africa Group is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all.