Staff Software Engineer, Discord
Desktop Platform
$248-279k
+ Equity
Voice, video and text communication platform
Job no longer available
Voice, video and text communication platform
1001+ employees
Job no longer available
$248-279k
+ Equity
1001+ employees
Company mission
To help friends and communities come together to hang out and explore their interests.
Role
Who you are
- 8+ years experience as a software engineer working on large, cross-platform desktop applications
- You have experience with desktop performance and are excited by the challenge of delivering an incredible product to 200 million users
- Expertise in Windows applications that interact with Windows Desktop Window Manager (DWM) and/or low-level graphics rendering
- Strong technical depth with C++ and/or Rust
- Exceptional problem-solving abilities, with a track record of diagnosing and resolving complex performance issues
- You understand observability and monitoring and leverages this to solve system issues
Desirable
- Active in the Electron community, with contributions to open source or technical talks at conferences
- Experience with Objective-C++, JavaScript/TypeScript and/or Python
- You excel in undefined environments and get excited about finding solutions to complex technical challenges
- Comfortable reading and writing code in large existing codebases
What the job involves
- We're looking for a Staff Engineer to join our Desktop Platform team to help lead the technical vision for Discord's client experience across Windows, macOS, and Linux
- You will report to our Engineering Manager, Desktop Platform, 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
- Build and maintain foundational components for Discord’s desktop clients, focusing on Discord’s In-Game Overlay
- Interface directly with Windows operating system APIs to leverage platform-specific capabilities
- Help drive engineering quality for desktop client performance, developing systems and processes to ensure quality can be optimized and sustainably maintained
- Troubleshoot complex issues using advanced debugging tools and techniques
- Support internal developers with desktop build environment and tooling
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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