Senior Systems Engineer, Cloudflare Data Platform

At Cloudflare, we’re not looking for people who wait for a polished roadmap; we’re looking for the builders who see the cracks in the Internet that everyone else has simply learned to live with. We value candidates who have the instinct to spot a “normalized” problem and the AI-native curiosity to create a solution using the latest tools. Our culture is built on iteration, leveraging AI to ship faster today to make it better tomorrow, while ensuring that every improvement, no matter how small, is shared across the team to lift everyone up. If you’re the type of person who values curiosity over bureaucracy, and that AI is a partner in solving tough problems to keep the Internet moving forward, you’ll fit right in., * R2 Data Catalog manages the Iceberg metadata and now performs ongoing maintenance, including compaction, to improve query performance, As a Senior Engineer focused on Cloudflare’s storage and database products, you will shape the future of industry-leading services that redefine what is possible for developers. We don’t just copy what other cloud providers do; we work backward from developer needs, reimagining solutions by leveraging our unique global network. This network brings data closer to users for unparalleled performance, allows for granular control to meet data residency requirements, and provides a platform for truly innovative data products.

• R2 SQL is our in-house distributed SQL engine, designed to perform petabyte-scale queries over your data in R2, * Minimum 6 years of experience working with distributed systems.
• Experience building and managing high volume software applications.
• Solid understanding of computer science fundamentals including data structures, algorithms, and object-oriented or functional design.
• Knowledge of at least one modern strongly-typed programming language: we primarily use Rust, TypeScript, and Go.
• Experience debugging, optimizing and identifying failure modes in a large-scale distributed system., * Experience building and managing a large scale data storage platform.
• Experience working in low-latency real time environments such as game streaming, game engine architecture, high frequency trading, payment systems
• Experience working in a non-garbage collected language such as Rust or C++.
• Experience writing Javascript and Typescript.Deep Linux / UNIX systems knowledge.

Pulled from the full job description

• 401(k)
• Health insurance
• Paid time off
• Vision insurance
• Dental insurance
• Flexible spending account
• Bereavement leave, Compensation may be adjusted depending on work location.
• For New York City, New Jersey, Washington, Washington DC, and California (excluding Bay Area) based hires: Estimated annual salary of $185,000 - $254,000, Cloudflare offers a complete package of benefits and programs to support you and your family. Our benefits programs can help you pay health care expenses, support caregiving, build capital for the future and make life a little easier and fun! The below is a description of our benefits for employees in the United States, and benefits may vary for employees based outside the U.S.

Health & Welfare Benefits

• Medical/Rx Insurance
• Dental Insurance
• Vision Insurance
• Flexible Spending Accounts
• Commuter Spending Accounts
• Fertility & Family Forming Benefits
• On-demand mental health support and Employee Assistance Program
• Global Travel Medical Insurance

Financial Benefits

• Short and Long Term Disability Insurance
• Life & Accident Insurance
• 401(k) Retirement Savings Plan
• Employee Stock Participation Plan

Time Off

• Flexible paid time off covering vacation and sick leave
• Leave programs, including parental, pregnancy health, medical, and bereavement leave

At Cloudflare, we are on a mission to help build a better Internet. Today the company runs one of the world’s largest networks that powers millions of websites and other Internet properties for customers ranging from individual bloggers to SMBs to Fortune 500 companies. Cloudflare protects and accelerates any Internet application online without adding hardware, installing software, or changing a line of code. Internet properties powered by Cloudflare all have web traffic routed through its intelligent global network, which gets smarter with every request. As a result, they see significant improvement in performance and a decrease in spam and other attacks. Cloudflare was named to Entrepreneur Magazine’s Top Company Cultures list and ranked among the World’s Most Innovative Companies by Fast Company., Cloudflare Data Platform has been announced during Birthday Week 2025. We are looking to extend engineering teams working on R2 Data Catalog and R2 SQL, You will own your code from inception to release, delivering solutions at all layers of the software stack to empower Cloudflare customers. On any given day, you might be architecting a new globally distributed data consistency model, optimizing storage engine performance, or designing a novel API for a new data-centric product. You can expect to interact with a variety of languages and technologies including, but not limited to JavaScript, Typescript, Rust, and C++., What Makes Cloudflare Special?

We’re not just a highly ambitious, large-scale technology company. We’re a highly ambitious, large-scale technology company with a soul. Fundamental to our mission to help build a better Internet is protecting the free and open Internet.

Project Galileo: Since 2014, we’ve equipped more than 2,400 journalism and civil society organizations in 111 countries with powerful tools to defend themselves against attacks that would otherwise censor their work, technology already used by Cloudflare’s enterprise customers-at no cost.

Athenian Project: In 2017, we created the Athenian Project to ensure that state and local governments have the highest level of protection and reliability for free, so that their constituents have access to election information and voter registration. Since the project, we’ve provided services to more than 425 local government election websites in 33 states.

1.1.1.1: We released 1.1.1.1 to help fix the foundation of the Internet by building a faster, more secure and privacy-centric public DNS resolver. This is available publicly for everyone to use - it is the first consumer-focused service Cloudflare has ever released. Here’s the deal - we don’t store client IP addresses never, ever. We will continue to abide by our privacy commitment and ensure that no user data is sold to advertisers or used to target consumers.

Sound like something you’d like to be a part of? We’d love to hear from you!

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.