Senior Staff Software Engineer, Discord
Client Platform
$304-342k
+ Equity
1+ day a week in office
Voice, video and text communication platform
Job no longer available
Voice, video and text communication platform
1001+ employees
Job no longer available
$304-342k
+ Equity
1+ day a week in office
1001+ employees
Company mission
To help friends and communities come together to hang out and explore their interests.
Role
Who you are
- 10+ years of experience as a software engineer working on large, cross-platform applications
- Deep understanding of client performance, with hands-on experience improving performance on mobile, desktop, and/or web platforms
- Strong expertise in JavaScript/TypeScript and React Native or Kotlin or Swift, with additional experience in low-level performance optimization (e.g., C++, profiling tools)
- A proven ability to diagnose and resolve complex performance issues
- Strong communication skills to drive clear technical discussions and build alignment across diverse teams
- Experience leading technical excellence, setting best practices for performance, quality, and accessibility at scale
Desirable
- Active in the React, React Native, or broader performance communities (open source contributions, technical talks, etc.)
- Experience optimizing applications for international markets with varying network conditions
- Experience with advanced profiling, instrumentation, and monitoring tools
- Background in game development or game-adjacent technologies
What the job involves
- We’re looking for a Senior Staff Engineer to join our Client Platform & Performance team to help lead the technical vision for Discord’s client experience across mobile, desktop, and web, with a special focus on building a fast, reliable, and delightful product for our growing global user base
- You will report to our Director of Engineering, Client Platform & Performance, and play a critical role in shaping the technical foundation that powers Discord's user experience for millions of people worldwide
- Our goal is to build products that our customers absolutely love - products that are functional, reliable, usable, and delightful, with performance as a core feature and an iterative approach to solving complex problems
- Lead technical direction and strategy for Discord’s client platforms, driving performance improvements across mobile, desktop, and web
- Architect and develop foundational client-side libraries and infrastructure, ensuring scalability, reliability, and exceptional end-to-end performance
- Optimize and evolve our React Native stack where it powers parts of our mobile experience, while collaborating on performance initiatives for other client technologies
- Own engineering quality for client performance, developing systems and processes to ensure it can be sustainably maintained and improved across all platforms
- Mentor and grow the next generation of technical leaders at Discord
Our take
Discord is an industry giant in the chat app space. The free platform has rapidly become one of the most popular services in the sector since being founded in 2015. It counts over 200M active users in 19M communities, successfully expanding beyond its original focus on video game players to become a broader social networking app and public forum.
Discord's userbase has grown rapidly as remote work has become the norm and a new generation of internet users has come online, attracted to its youthful presentation and plethora of gaming and social tools. It has since fended off takeover bids from Microsoft and interest from other giants such as Amazon and X, and has grown into a profitable company, funded by optional subscription fees and commissions from sales through the platform.
Discord’s remarkable growth, however, is not without obstacles. The company faces competition from deep-pocketed giants like Facebook, and regulatory concerns from those worried about the platform’s relatively light chat moderation. However, the company has the resources and expertise to adapt. For example, the acquisition of harassment detection software company Sentropy will go a long way towards placating the concerns of critics, as will the 2024 acquisition of teen app Gas used to give anonymous compliments to friends. All of these purchases are part of Discord's move to expand out of its mostly gaming-focused customer base.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
28% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Funding (last 2 of 9 rounds)
Sep 2021
$500m
SERIES H
Dec 2020
$100m
SERIES H
Total funding: $979.3m
Company HQ
Potrero Hill, San Francisco, CA
Leadership
Stanislav Vishnevskiy
(Co-Founder & CTO)Previously worked as a Software Engineer at Casamba and then Kabam. Also worked as a Lead Software Engineer at GREE International, and founded social network Guildwork.com in 2009.
Humam Sakhnini
(CEO)Humam joined the Discord team in 2025 as CEO. Prior to this, he was the VIce Chairman and Chief Strategy & Talent Officer at Activision Blizzard as well as the CFO/President at King. He also spent 8 years at McKinsey & Company as a Partner.
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