Hybrid Systems Engineer, Containers at Cloudflare
Cloudflare · Hybrid, United States Of America · Hybrid
- Office in Hybrid
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.
We realize people do not fit into neat boxes. We are looking for curious and empathetic individuals who are committed to developing themselves and learning new skills, and we are ready to help you do that. We cannot complete our mission without building a diverse and inclusive team. We hire the best people based on an evaluation of their potential and support them throughout their time at Cloudflare. Come join us!
Position Location: Austin, TX
Cloudflare is building a brand new way of running globally distributed compute for both CPU and GPU workloads. We're leveraging our expansive edge network as a unified compute resource to enable ultra-low latency applications and drive new product development. Our team is scaling this internal capability into a robust, standalone platform for both internal and external users, tackling challenging compute problems such as securely sandboxing AI-generated code, building a high-throughput network data plane where every millisecond counts, designing a global control plane for scheduling, and deeply integrating Containers as a publicly launched extension of Durable Objects binding.
We're seeking engineers who will contribute to these challenges, aligning strongly with one of two core profiles:
Skills & Technologies: What You'll Bring
We're looking for engineers who strongly align with one of two core profiles. Regardless of focus, you'll need excellent operational instincts, a knack for developing robust systems, and the critical ability to root cause complex issues across highly distributed environments, ensuring our global platform's performance and robustness.
Profile 1: Control Plane & Developer Experience
This profile is for engineers passionate about building the orchestration layers and developer-facing tools that make our platform accessible, reliable, and powerful.
- Experience with API design and implementation for platform services.
- Proficiency with TypeScript for Wrangler CLI and building control plane logic in Cloudflare Workers (including Durable Objects).
- Designing and implementing global and inner-datacenter scheduling logic.
- Developing and maintaining resource lifecycle management features for distributed workloads.
- Implementing control plane security features (e.g., authentication, authorization).
- Some experience with React for UI development is a plus.
- Strong understanding of operations and setting up effective development environments.
Profile 2: Core Runtime & Data Plane
This profile is for engineers who thrive on deep systems work, optimizing performance at the kernel level, and managing critical infrastructure components.
- Strong Linux systems and network programming expertise is fundamental for this profile.
- Expertise in machine-level virtualization and security (e.g., Firecracker, gVisor, QEMU).
- Proficiency in machine-level scheduling and process management (e.g., containerd, cgroups, KVM), including memory sharing and CPU throttling.
- Deep understanding of high-throughput networking data planes and advanced Linux kernel networking/routing.
- Strong familiarity with Golang for low-level systems components and platform drivers.
- Experience with Nomad for resource orchestration.
- Knowledge of logging, metrics, billing, and health check systems for large-scale distributed infrastructure.
- eBPF experience is valuable.
- Rust (e.g., Firecracker & rust-vmm) is valuable but not required.
- Strong understanding of operations and development environment setup.
If building and being challenged on these cutting-edge platforms excites you, and you're ready to make a significant impact on how the internet computes, apply now.
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!
This position may require access to information protected under U.S. export control laws, including the U.S. Export Administration Regulations. Please note that any offer of employment may be conditioned on your authorization to receive software or technology controlled under these U.S. export laws without sponsorship for an export license.
Cloudflare is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We are committed to providing equal employment opportunity for all people and place great value in both diversity and inclusiveness. All qualified applicants will be considered for employment without regard to their, or any other person's, perceived or actual race, color, religion, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, age, physical or mental disability, medical condition, family care status, or any other basis protected by law. We are an AA/Veterans/Disabled Employer.
Cloudflare provides reasonable accommodations to qualified individuals with disabilities. Please tell us if you require a reasonable accommodation to apply for a job. Examples of reasonable accommodations include, but are not limited to, changing the application process, providing documents in an alternate format, using a sign language interpreter, or using specialized equipment. If you require a reasonable accommodation to apply for a job, please contact us via e-mail at [email protected] or via mail at 101 Townsend St. San Francisco, CA 94107.
