Join Shopify as a Principal Engineer
Solve cutting edge problems of scale, growth, and usability for all of commerce.
Do impactful work
Shopify powers millions of businesses in more than 175 countries with essential commerce infrastructure. Our infrastructure is built so anyone can ship fast and ship early. Our teams continuously deploy new code on a large scale to support hundreds of thousands of online stores and hundreds of millions of requests a day. We build the tools so anyone can start a business and thrive. Principal Engineers commonly move around different product areas to help solve the hardest problems across all of Shopify.
Create company-wide impact
Work on the most mission-critical and challenging problems at scale, while building reliable platforms that last. Influence other executive leaders, and level up the engineering craft as a whole.
Influence roadmaps and strategy
Use your technical depth to guide our engineering teams to shipping robust products and infrastructure
Identify and lead technical initiatives
Use your eye to identify future technical problems and opportunities for commerce
Own domain scope
Debug the most curious types of issues and lead teams out of architectural holes
Bring your skills to the table
While you don't chase “the new cool thing”, you do follow trends in the industry and within the company, and help others understand how they affect what we do
Passionate about building reliable platforms
You love building a reliable platform that merchants rely on for their most critical business activities.
Excited to improve in utility, reliability, and ergonomics
The things you build work well, stay working, and don't create painful work for others.
Know when to swing an axe and when to use the sandpaper
You appreciate the value of incremental improvement, but aren't afraid of big moves to escape local maxima.
Can bring your experience to solve the hard problems
You bring creativity and experience to debug issues or implement components with little margin for error.
Can get up to speed on any technical domain or problem quickly
You combine your aptitude for systems thinking with a large library of pattern-matching from your experience.
Always looking for ways to make high-leverage improvements
The worse the procedures and practices, the more you're excited about the room for improvement.
Work where you work best
Shopify has a digital-first approach. We hire you based on your location and you work from wherever you are most productive. We then come together in person a few times each year to foster connections, tackle challenging issues, and align as a team. This way of working is known as Digital by Design, or DxD.
“Success and leverage will often come through empowering and teaching others: engage, mediate, coach, ..., and quietly recede without anyone noticing”
Additional resources
Shopify Editions
A semi-annual showcase demonstrating the speed and breadth of innovation at Shopify
Learn moreThe Principal Engineer's Handbook
A guide based on experience with Principal, Distinguished, and Fellow-level engineers
Learn more