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Staff Software Engineer, Inference

CoreWeave · Sunnyvale, CA / Bellevue, WA

$188K to $275K

Apply on CoreWeave's site
Company
CoreWeave
Location
Sunnyvale, CA / Bellevue, WA
Team
Technology
Pay
$188K to $275K a year, as listed in the posting
Posted
May 7, 2026
Category
Machine learning and AI engineering

About the role

CoreWeave is The Essential Cloud for AI™. Built for pioneers by pioneers, CoreWeave delivers a platform of technology, tools, and teams that enables innovators to build and scale AI with confidence. Trusted by leading AI labs, startups, and global enterprises, CoreWeave combines superior infrastructure performance with deep technical expertise to accelerate breakthroughs and turn compute into capability. Founded in 2017, CoreWeave became a publicly traded company (Nasdaq: CRWV) in March 2025. Learn more at www.coreweave.com.

What You’ll Do:

Inference Platform Team
The Inference team builds and operates CoreWeave’s Kubernetes-native inference platform, powering low-latency, high-throughput AI workloads at massive scale. The team is responsible for request routing, scheduling, GPU resource management, and system-wide optimizations that drive performance, efficiency, and reliability across real-time inference systems.

About the role:
As a Staff Software Engineer (IC5) on the Inference team, you will act as a technical leader driving architecture, performance, and reliability across multiple services and teams. Your day-to-day will involve leading cross-team design initiatives, optimizing inference performance (latency, throughput, and GPU utilization), and improving system reliability at scale. You will work deeply in distributed systems and Kubernetes-based infrastructure, focusing on areas like scheduling, batching, and memory optimization. This role requires hands-on technical leadership and the ability to influence engineering direction across the organization.

Who You Are:

8–12+ years of experience building and operating large-scale distributed systems or cloud platforms

Proven experience leading cross-team technical initiatives impacting multiple services or organizations

Strong programming skills in Go, Python, or C++

Deep expertise in Kubernetes at production scale, including orchestration, scheduling, and service design

Strong understanding of distributed systems, networking, and performance optimization

Experience designing and operating low-latency, high-throughput systems with strict P95/P99 latency requirements

Hands-on experience with inference systems, including batching or micro-batching strategies, caching, and memory optimization

Experience improving system performance using metrics-driven approaches (e.g., latency, throughput, utilization)

Familiarity with mixed precision (BF16, FP8) and streaming inference workloads

Preferred:

Experience with inference frameworks such as vLLM, Triton, TensorRT-LLM, Ray Serve, or TorchServe

Experience with GPU systems and performance optimization (CUDA, NCCL, RDMA, NUMA, GPU interconnects)

Experience leading multi-team or org-level technical initiatives

Exposure to large-scale AI/ML infrastructure or hyperscale cloud environments

Wondering if you’re a good fit?
We believe in investing in our people, and value candidates who can bring their own diversified experiences to our teams – even if you aren't a 100% skill or experience match. Here are a few qualities we’ve found compatible with our team. If some of this describes you, we’d love to talk.

You love to design and optimize high-performance distributed systems at scale

You’re curious about AI inference, GPU systems, and emerging performance techniques

You’re an expert in building reliable, low-latency infrastructure and driving system-wide improvements

Why CoreWeave?
At CoreWeave, we work hard, have fun, and move fast! We’re in an exciting stage of hyper-growth that you will not want to miss out on. We’re not afraid of a little chaos, and we’re constantly learning. Our team cares deeply about how we build our product and how we work together, which is represented through our core values:

Be Curious at Your Core

Act Like an Owner

Empower Employees

Deliver Best-in-Class Client Experiences

Achieve More Together

We support and encourage an entrepreneurial outlook and independent thinking. We foster an environment that encourages collaboration and enables the development of innovative solutions to complex problems. As we get set for takeoff, the organization's growth opportunities are constantly expanding. You will be surrounded by some of the best talent in the industry, who will want to learn from you, too. Come join us!

The base salary range for this role is $188,000 to $275,000. The starting salary will be determined based on job-related knowledge, skills, experience, and market location. We strive for both market alignment and internal equity when determining compensation. In addition to base salary, our total rewards package includes a discretionary bonus, equity awards, and a comprehensive benefits program (all based on eligibility).
What We Offer

In addition to a competitive salary, we offer a variety of benefits to support your needs. The benefits below reflect our US-based offerings for full-time employees; for roles in other locations, benefits vary and are shared during the hiring process. These include:

Medical, dental, and vision insurance - 100% paid for by CoreWeave

Company-paid Life Insurance

Voluntary supplemental life insurance

Short and long-term disability insurance

Flexible Spending Account

Health Savings Account

Tuition Reimbursement

Ability to Participate in Employee Stock Purchase Program (ESPP)

Mental Wellness Benefits through Spring Health

Family-Forming support provided by Carrot

Paid Parental Leave

Flexible, full-service childcare support with Kinside

401(k) with a generous employer match

Flexible PTO

Catered lunch each day in our office and data center locations

A casual work environment

A work culture focused on innovative disruption

California Applicants

California Consumer Privacy Act

Equal Opportunity & Accommodations

CoreWeave is an equal opportunity employer, committed to fostering an inclusive and supportive workplace. All qualified applicants and candidates will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, disability, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, veteran status, or genetic information.

As part of this commitment and consistent with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), CoreWeave will ensure that qualified applicants and candidates with disabilities are provided reasonable accommodations for the hiring process, unless such accommodation would cause an undue hardship. If reasonable accommodation is needed, please contact: careers@coreweave.com.

Export Control Compliance

This position requires access to technology and/or source code subject to U.S. export control laws. Any such access will be provided only in compliance with applicable U.S. export control requirements. As part of the recruitment process, CoreWeave may request limited information reasonably necessary to assess applicable export-control requirements.

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