Senior Effects Engine Engineer

Company Description

About the Group/Team

We're the Video team within the Design Experience Supergroup, and we’re on a mission to empower every user to tell compelling visual stories through video. We build intuitive, powerful tools and rendering infrastructure that help users go from idea to impact—seamlessly. Together, we’re shaping the future of multimedia creation, and this role will be core to enabling innovation across Canva’s intelligent video editing experiences.

Job Description

About the Role

You’ll architect high-performance effect rendering pipelines and intuitive toolchains that accelerate effect development, unlock creative expression, and ensure seamless integration across platforms and devices. Your work will directly enable Canva’s global community to create magic at scale with powerful, easy-to-use video features.

What you’ll do (responsibilities)

• Build and maintain a cross-platform multimedia effects SDK supporting iOS, Android, Web, and desktop.
• Develop tooling to support special effects content creation, testing, and asset lifecycle management.
• Design mobile-side effect asset management systems for optimal storage, loading, and update handling.
• Integrate new visual features (e.g. 3D, facial effects, dynamic shaders) with Canva's custom rendering engine.
• Prototype and productionise next-gen effects including AI-powered, multimodal, and real-time effects.
• Translate industry research into productised capabilities with stunning visual fidelity.
• Collaborate with design, AI, and product teams to elevate Canva's effect ecosystem.

Qualifications

What we're looking for

• Advanced proficiency in C++ for engine/SDK development; solid in Java, Objective-C/Swift, and JavaScript/TypeScript.
• Experience in mobile app development and performance optimisation.
• Proficient in at least one graphics API (OpenGL, Metal, Vulkan, DirectX) and shader languages (GLSL, HLSL).
• Familiar with large-scale codebase management, version control (Git), and automated testing practices.
• Nice-to-have: AI deployment experience on-device (e.g., CoreML, QNN), DCC tool experience (e.g. Maya, Substance).
• Ability to design scalable graphics architectures and work closely with designers to push the boundaries of visual creativity
• Passion for empowering creativity and solving complex visual problems
• Full proficiency in English communications.

Additional Information

What you will learn and develop at Canva

• Push the boundaries of creative tooling in the browser using modern graphics and ML
• Collaborate in an interdisciplinary team at the cutting edge of video editing, design, and AI
• Gain expertise in scaling high-performance rendering and multimedia UX
• Shape Canva's future in intelligent cross-platform video creation and editing products.