Software Engineer - Network Platforms

About Us

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.

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.

Available Locations: Austin, Texas

About the role

About the team

The Network Platforms team contributes to Traffic Management functions at Cloudflare. One of the multiple teams responsible for the systems that optimize the flow of traffic into, through, and from Cloudflare's global network.

You would be working on the latest Linux network technologies and low level details of the network protocols. The code written would be running on thousands of servers and will be directly impacting each of the packets crossing the network infrastructure, that directly maps to numerous products and millions of customers. These systems are key to Cloudflare's mission to make the internet faster, safer, and more reliable.

Our team at Cloudflare operates under a "Run What You Build" model. This means we are responsible for the health of our systems and actively participate in our team's on-call rotation as part of our operational duties.

What you’ll do

You will build and extend various systems that carry traffic end-to-end on the egress path of Cloudflare network. Starting at the host server linux kernel, with integration towards the network hardware dataplane until the physical Interconnect to an adjacent network. Millions of customers depend on these systems even if not directly visible to them. You'll be solving problems of massive scale and significance, and shaping the future of reliability and performance on the Internet. You will collaborate with engineers across the company, from operations teams to the teams building customer-facing products.

What we are looking for

We are looking for smart, innovative team players that have experience in covering Linux kernel network stack development (particularly with eBPF), complex distributed systems, and understanding of internet protocols and technologies. Particularly, growth-oriented individuals who enjoy being outside of their comfort zones, are comfortable in a fast-paced but sensible work environment and that value and lead with curiosity and empathy.

Role requirements

Systems-level programming experience in Go, Python, Rust, C, or C++

A solid grasp of BGP and internet routing.

Relish opportunities to dive into new technologies, and a demonstrated ability to do so

Experience in implementing, deploying, and debugging mission-critical distributed systems

Strong collaboration and communication skills.

Bonus Points

Skills the role requires, we are happy to hel