Senior Systems Engineer, Cloudflare
Browser Isolation
This role is eligible to participate in Cloudflare’s equity plan
Web performance and security platform
Be an early applicant
Web performance and security platform
1001+ employees
Be an early applicant
This role is eligible to participate in Cloudflare’s equity plan
1001+ employees
Company mission
To help build a better Internet that is bold and ambitious.
Role
Who you are
- Strong production C++ proficiency, including memory and resource ownership, concurrency, and debugging in substantial codebases
- A track record of independently leading complex systems or distributed-service improvements across multiple components, from an unclear problem to a reliable production outcome
- Strong Linux/UNIX and networking fundamentals, with experience diagnosing correctness, latency, and resource-consumption issues using profiling and operational evidence
- Experience designing and operating distributed systems, with sound judgment about service boundaries, data partitioning, consistency, timeouts and retries, backpressure, capacity limits, and recovery from partial failures
- Experience designing safe rollout and recovery strategies and maintaining production software over its lifecycle
- Ability to communicate trade-offs clearly, align stakeholders, mentor teammates, and improve engineering practices through constructive feedback
- A willingness to work across C++, Rust, Go, and TypeScript and learn unfamiliar parts of the stack
Desirable
- These are preferred qualifications, not prerequisites. Prior Browser Isolation or Cloudflare experience is not required
- Browser engines, Chromium, browser sandboxing, or security-sensitive systems
- Low-latency streaming, graphics, remote computing, or other real-time systems
- Container and workload orchestration, including Nomad or Kubernetes, and service discovery
- Experience using Rust for systems programming or distributed services
- Go or TypeScript; WebRTC, Skia, WebAssembly, or WebGL
- Production observability, capacity planning, incident response, or build and release infrastructure
What the job involves
- Cloudflare Browser Isolation runs web content in remote browsers, helping protect users from threats while preserving a responsive browsing experience. Our team builds the Chromium-based browsing engine, remote rendering and streaming technology, and distributed services that manage browser sessions across Cloudflare’s global network
- You will work at the intersection of systems programming, distributed systems, and security. Engineers contribute across the product, collaborating on browser changes, service orchestration, observability, and build infrastructure
- At this level, you will be accountable for outcomes across a problem area that may span several components. You will establish technical direction, make uncertainty and trade-offs explicit, and help other engineers succeed while remaining hands-on. This is an individual-contributor role; people-management experience is not required
- Technologies we use:
- Browser engine: Chromium and C++
- Systems programming: Rust
- Distributed services and orchestration: Go, TypeScript, Cloudflare Workers, Nomad, and Consul
- Remote rendering and streaming: WebRTC and Skia
- Browser client: TypeScript, WebAssembly, and WebGL
- Lead complex, multi-component initiatives from problem definition and design through implementation, staged rollout, and measurable production outcomes
- Design and implement changes in our Chromium-based C++ browser and the distributed services and systems components supporting remote browsing, working across Go, Rust, and TypeScript
- Make and explain architectural trade-offs across latency, availability, resource efficiency, security boundaries, and operational complexity
- Investigate difficult cross-layer failures and performance bottlenecks, distinguishing browser, host, network, and control-plane causes
- Improve resilience, capacity management, observability, and release safety; define success metrics and validate results
- Coordinate work with partner teams, surface dependencies and risks early, and guide delivery through ambiguity
- Mentor engineers and raise the quality of code reviews, design reviews, testing, documentation, and operational practices
- Participate in the team’s production on-call rotation after onboarding, lead technical incident investigations as needed, and drive durable corrective actions
- This role may require flexibility to be on-call outside of standard working hours to address technical issues as needed
Application process
- Please note that applicants who progress to the offer stage of the interview process may be asked to attend an in-person interview within one of the Cloudflare Offices or Cloudflare Hubs. More details about this will be available at that stage of the interview process
Our take
Cloudflare is a multi-service global network that provides web security and infrastructure, DDoS mitigation services, and a content delivery network. Founded in 2009, Cloudflare has risen to become an industry giant, with over 25 million global internet properties on its network.
Cloudflare has been responsible for a number of admirable initiatives, offering free web protection to human rights groups, journalists, artists, and US election websites. This goes some way to counteracting the flak Cloudflare has received in some circles for the controversial groups and users who use its services. This chequered history, however, has not affected its over 80% market share in the content delivery network field.
This is perhaps in part because it has proven sharp at staying abreast of the rapidly morphing tech and digital space and customer demands. For example, Cloudflare is shifting to 100% renewable energy usage to create a zero-emissions internet, and in 2020 released a feature that would help users navigate data privacy regulations by selecting where their data is stored.
And impressive third-quarter 2025 results show strong momentum, with revenue rising to $562 million from $430 million a year earlier. The company also raised its full-year guidance, underscoring confidence in continued growth. As demand for secure, cloud-based infrastructure keeps growing, Cloudflare's expanding platform and improving efficiency leave it well positioned to capture further gains in a rapidly growing market.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
16% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Company benefits
- Competitive pay: We offer a competitive total rewards package, where every employee is an owner of our stock.
- Take-what-you-need vacation: We encourage employees to find a comfortable work-life balance by taking as many days off as they need while still being able to perform their jobs satisfactorily. (We really mean it!)
- Paid maternity & paternity leave: Our global parental leave policy allows up to sixteen paid weeks of bonding leave time for all qualifying new parents.
- Employee benefits: We offer a comprehensive benefits package including healthcare, life insurance, short- and long-term disability, pension plans in accordance with the market practice in our locations.
- Commuter program: We are flexible about where we work and value connecting at the office. Our commuter benefits program is in place to support team members' commute to work via public transportation without the extra cost burden.
- Wellbeing: Global offerings that provide mental health, childcare and family forming support to our employees across our offices.
Company HQ
China Basin, San Francisco, CA
Leadership
Lee Holloway
(Co-Founder & Lead Engineer)Lee began their career as an Engineer at Homewarehouse for a year before working at Unspam Technologies for 4 years. They co-created Project Honey Pot in 2004 and Cloudflare in March 2009, serving as Lead Engineer of both to present.
Michelle Zatlyn
(Co-Founder, President & Co-Chair)Having worked for Investor Economics and I Love Rewards for a combined 4 years, Michelle worked at Toshiba for 3 years as a Product Manager. She then co-founded Cloudflare in 2009 as COO, and has served as President since 2020. She is also a Board Member at Atlassian.
Matthew Prince
(Co-Founder & CEO)Matthew studied for an MBA at Harvard Business School before co-founding Unspam Technologies in December 2001, and Cloudflare in 2009, where he has served as CEO ever since.
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