Staff Platform Engineer, Quizlet
Database Systems
$220.7-268.1k
+ Company stock options
More information about location
3+ days a week in office
Learning tools for students and teachers
Be an early applicant
Learning tools for students and teachers
501-1000 employees
Be an early applicant
$220.7-268.1k
+ Company stock options
More information about location
3+ days a week in office
501-1000 employees
Company mission
To give every student the tools and confidence to succeed, no matter their motivation or what they’re striving to achieve.
Role
Who you are
- Strong software engineering foundation — you write production-quality code, design scalable systems, and can reason about distributed systems tradeoffs
- 5–8 years of hands-on database engineering experience in production environments handling significant scale (thousands of RPS or more)
- Deep MySQL expertise (replication, sharding, query optimization, connection management); PlanetScale experience a plus
- Multi-database proficiency with Cloud Spanner, Postgres, and/or BigQuery
- Production experience with in-memory caches (Redis, Memcached, or Valkey)
- Kubernetes (GKE preferred) and Terraform experience for infrastructure as code
- Strong coding skills in Python or Go for automation, tooling, and platform services
- Hands-on experience with GCP database services (Cloud Spanner, Cloud SQL, Memorystore, BigQuery) and monitoring platforms like Datadog
- Strong understanding of backup/recovery, HA patterns, and incident response
Desirable
- Experience with Vitess or PlanetScale MySQL
- Knowledge of Istio service mesh and database connection management patterns
- Experience with data streaming platforms (Kafka, Pub/Sub)
What the job involves
- We’re hiring a Staff Platform Engineer – Database Systems to be a core member of our Platform Engineering team
- . You’ll contribute across the full infrastructure stack while bringing deep expertise in database systems, performance optimization, and data reliability. This role reports to the Senior Director of Technical Infrastructure
- Platform Reliability & System Resilience: Develop, test, and implement infrastructure automation and tooling to maintain 99.95% availability under peak load. Build self-healing capabilities, optimize resource utilization across Kubernetes clusters (GKE), and contribute to platform-wide resilience initiatives
- Database Performance & Operations: Serve as the team’s database expert, diagnosing and resolving performance issues across Cloud Spanner, PlanetScale MySQL, and BigQuery. Conduct query analysis, implement indexing strategies, and optimize connection pooling to maintain sub-100ms p99 latency
- Caching & Data Access Layer: Design and implement caching strategies using Memorystore (Redis/Memcached). Build high-volume connection management systems (in Go or Python) that efficiently handle database and cache access patterns under sustained load
- Infrastructure as Code & Automation: Manage platform infrastructure using Terraform and Kubernetes. Build automation that improves developer velocity, reduces MTTR, and enables safe, self-service infrastructure operations
- Observability & Operational Excellence: Design and deploy instrumentation within Datadog for monitoring databases, caches, and platform services. Use post-incident analyses (e.g., Jeli) to reduce operational toil and improve service reliability
- Architectural Consulting & Standards: Partner with Product Engineering teams to review designs, define SLOs, optimize data access patterns, and ensure new services are resilient and operable before production deployment
Our take
Quizlet has evolved from a simple flashcard tool into one of the most recognizable consumer learning platforms, now serving over 60M active users. It reaches two-third of US high schoolers and half of college students, putting it among the top 20 US websites and leading education apps on mobile.
Its core strength lies in helping students learn quickly and effectively through tools like flashcards, practice tests, AI-generated study guides, and now course-specific collaborative folders. By focusing on efficiency and relevance, Quizlet has become a go-to resource for students who want targeted, outcome-driven study support. And its collaborative features also allow large groups of students to share and refine materials together, so learning really is a shared experience.
Recent expansions - including Course-Powered Quizlet and its deepened partnership with Brand Metrics - show the platform's continued momentum. With AI-driven personalization, independent ad measurement, and growing peer-recommended content, Quizlet is strengthening trust with advertisers while meeting modern student expectations. And these advancements sure position Quizlet as a leading, forward-thinking plater in ed-tech.
Freddie
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
75% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Funding (last 2 of 3 rounds)
May 2020
$30m
SERIES C
Feb 2018
$20m
SERIES B
Total funding: $62m
Company benefits
- Competitive Healthcare: Comprehensive health, dental, vision and disability plans for you and your family. 100% paid premiums for employees, 75% for dependents
- PTO & Family Benefits: Everyone gets 20 days of PTO, a minimum of 10 paid holidays, and 5 volunteer days off. We also provide resources for growing families, such as Carrot (fertility & family forming) and UrbanSitter (daycare & nannies). Our generous family leave plan offers 12 weeks of leave plus disability leave for birthing mothers when welcoming a new little learner into their family.
- Learning & Development: Here at Quizlet, we invest in our employees’ career development to support learning and professional growth. Employees have access to LinkedIn Learning, an on-demand learning solution designed to help them gain new skills and advance their careers. We host speakers and workshops and also offer support for other professional development opportunities.
- Shared Financial Success: Competitive salaries, stock options and a 401k match that makes saving for retirement easy.
- Wellness: We strive to promote the physical and mental health & well-being of our employees. We offer resources for mental health & well-being, plus a $100/month reimbursement towards wellness and fitness memberships.
- Commuter Benefits: We don’t have a school bus, but we'll help cover 50% of your public commuter & parking costs, plus pre-tax FSA. If you decide to work late, your ride home is on us.
Company HQ
China Basin, San Francisco, CA
Leadership
Kurt Beidler
(CEO)Prior to joining Quizlet in 2024, Kurt was the Co-CEO of Swift. He also spent 17 years at Amazon in various roles, including General Manager of Automotive Sales, Advertising, and Amazon Kids as well as Director of Kindle Content in Beijing.
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