Staff Software Engineer - Video Performance - (Bay area only)

Canva
San Francisco
Workplace: OnsiteFull timeUSD 251,000 - 329,000 annuallyFunction: Software EngineeringSkills: ["Systems thinking","Profiling","Diagnostics","Collaboration","Influencing peers"]

Own end-to-end video performance for the full creation pipeline, from timeline scrubbing and real-time preview through export and rendering. Profile and optimize critical paths in Canva’s C++ native engine, shader code, and ML-powered effect pipelines to reduce latency and memory use. Build observability and automated regression suites, define user-perceived performance metrics, and collaborate with Video Engine and AI teams. Use hardware acceleration via Metal, Vulkan, and WebGPU across devices.

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FursaFursa
Canva
Canva
2 days ago

Staff Software Engineer - Video Performance - (Bay area only)

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Canonical indexed version, validated from employer's careers page.

Source: Company careers pageValidated by: Fursa AI
Last checked: 3 hours agoStatus: Live
Reposted: similar role first listed 6 months ago

Job Summary

Own end-to-end video performance for the full creation pipeline, from timeline scrubbing and real-time preview through export and rendering. Profile and optimize critical paths in Canva’s C++ native engine, shader code, and ML-powered effect pipelines to reduce latency and memory use. Build observability and automated regression suites, define user-perceived performance metrics, and collaborate with Video Engine and AI teams. Use hardware acceleration via Metal, Vulkan, and WebGPU across devices.
Location: San Francisco
Workplace: Onsite
Employment Type: Full time
Job Function: Software Engineering
Seniority: Mid level

Key Responsibilities

  • •Lead end-to-end video performance strategy across the creation lifecycle, identifying bottlenecks and driving measurable improvements to the editing experience.
  • •Profile and optimize critical paths in Canva’s C++ native engine, GLSL/HLSL shaders, and ML-powered effect pipelines to reduce latency and memory footprint.
  • •Design and build observability systems and automated regression suites to capture performance metrics such as FPS, jank, memory usage, and thermal behavior across Web, iOS, and Android.
  • •Define and own performance metrics that reflect user-perceived fluidity and creative flow, ensuring performance stays a first-class product feature.
  • •Collaborate with Video Engine and AI engineers to evolve system architecture for improved parallelism, cache locality, and asynchronous processing, leveraging hardware acceleration APIs where needed.

Pay and Benefits

Salary: USD 251,000 - 329,000 annually
Equity and Bonus:Equity
Perks:Equity PackagesHealth Insurance401kParental LeaveFlexible Leave

Key Requirements

  • •Treat performance as a product feature and optimize complex, multi-threaded systems with clear trade-off reasoning across latency, memory, and maintainability.
  • •Strong proficiency in C++.
  • •Strong understanding of CPU/GPU architectures, memory hierarchies, and SIMD.
  • •Experience with graphics APIs such as OpenGL, Metal, or Vulkan.
  • •Experience profiling and diagnostics using tools like Perf, Instruments, Chrome DevTools, Systrace, or custom telemetry, and using telemetry at scale to validate impact.
Skills:Systems thinkingProfilingDiagnosticsCollaborationInfluencing peers
Languages:English
Tech Stack:C++RustGLSLHLSLOpenGLMetalVulkanWebGPUPerfInstrumentsChrome DevToolsSystraceH.264H.265VP9AV1IOSAndroidML

Company Brief

Canva
Canva is an online visual communications platform that provides drag-and-drop design tools, templates, and media assets for creating presentations, social media graphics, videos, documents and more, serving individuals and large enterprises globally.
Industry: Enterprise Software
Company Size: Enterprise (1,001+ employees)
Revenue: USD 1B+
Growth: Scaleup
Valuation: Decacorn (USD 10B+)
Funding: Series E+
Headquarters: Surry Hills, New South Wales, Australia
Founded: 2012
Glassdoor
Glassdoor: 3.9
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