Staff Software Engineer - Web Platform (Frontend)

2 Weeks ago • All levels • Devops

Job Summary

Job Description

Canva is seeking a Staff Software Engineer to join their Web Platform team, focusing on frontend development. This role involves driving product performance improvements by exploring emerging technologies, leading architectural efforts around code bundling and delivery, and developing systems for performance regression detection. The engineer will collaborate across teams on technically complex initiatives, shape the future of Canva's web platform, and blend product impact with infrastructure evolution. Responsibilities include designing JavaScript-based RPC clients, exploring React Server Components, and optimizing bundling and delivery pipelines. The ideal candidate will have deep experience with core web technologies (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, TypeScript, React, MobX) and backend stacks (Node.js, Java), with a strong understanding of build systems and performance tooling. Experience in leading end-to-end technical initiatives, driving clarity in ambiguous spaces, and operating in large-scale environments is also crucial.
Must have:
  • Deep experience with HTML, CSS, JavaScript, TypeScript, React, MobX
  • Experience with backend stacks like Node.js, Java
  • Strong grasp of build systems and performance tooling
  • Leading end-to-end technical initiatives
  • Driving clarity in ambiguous technical problems
  • Experience in large-scale environments and cross-functional collaboration
  • Balancing long-term architectural thinking with hands-on execution
  • Creating and advocating for performance observability systems
Good to have:
  • Exploring emerging technologies for product performance
  • Evaluating and evolving systems for scale and speed
  • Developing tooling for performance regression detection
  • Collaborating across multiple teams on complex initiatives
  • Mentoring others through design reviews and implementation guidance
  • Translating performance metrics into real user impact
  • Contributing to company-wide goals with broad customer impact
  • Designing and delivering JavaScript-based RPC clients
  • Exploring React Server Components
  • Shaping code bundling and delivery infrastructure
Perks:
  • Equity packages
  • Inclusive parental leave policy
  • Annual Vibe & Thrive allowance
  • Flexible leave options

Job Details

Job Description

Join the team redefining how the world experiences design.

Hey, gday, mabuhay, kia ora,你好, hallo, vítejte!

Thanks for stopping by. We know job hunting can be a little time consuming and you're probably keen to find out what's on offer, so we'll get straight to the point. 

Where and how you can work

Our flagship campus is in Sydney. We also have a campus in Melbourne and co-working spaces in Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide. But you have choice in where and how you work. That means if you want to do your thing in the office (if you're near one), at home or a bit of both, it's up to you. 

What you’d be doing in this role

As Canva scales change continues to be part of our DNA. But we like to think that's all part of the fun. So this will give you the flavour of the type of things you'll be working on when you start, but this will likely evolve.

At the moment, this role is focused on:

  • Driving product performance improvements by exploring emerging technologies and applying them across key product experiences.
  • Leading architectural efforts around code bundling and delivery, evaluating and evolving our systems to support scale, reduce bottlenecks, and enable engineering velocity.
  • Developing tooling and systems that empower engineers with visibility into performance regressions before they reach production – through automated detection and validation workflows.
  • Collaborating across multiple teams to lead technically complex, large-scale, ambiguous initiatives – bringing high-level expertise, context sharing, and strategic clarity to drive scalable solutions.
  • Shaping the future of Canva’s web platform, blending product impact with infrastructure evolution to support millions of users while enabling sustainable engineering growth.

You're probably a match if you have:

  • Deep experience with core web technologies (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, TypeScript, React, MobX or similar) and backend stacks (Node.js, Java), with a track record of delivering high-quality solutions across the stack.
  • A strong grasp of build systems and performance tooling – from bundling and minification to web vitals – and the ability to architect for scale and speed.
  • A history of leading end-to-end technical initiatives, influencing not just how features are built, but what gets built and why.
  • Proven ability to drive clarity in high-ambiguity spaces, tackling complex or undefined technical problems and aligning multiple teams toward a shared direction.
  • Experience operating in large-scale environments – managing cross-functional collaboration, influencing technical roadmaps, and aligning with stakeholders across the org.
  • A habit of initiating and scaling cross-team efforts, especially in hybrid product-platform spaces where coordination and strategic thinking are critical.
  • A mindset that balances long-term architectural thinking with hands-on execution, including mentoring others through design reviews, spikes, and implementation guidance.
  • Practical experience creating and advocating for performance observability systems, embedding performance goals into the developer workflow.
  • The ability to translate performance metrics into real user impact – not just what the numbers say, but what they mean for experience and product outcomes.
  • A drive to contribute to company-wide goals, particularly in spaces with broad customer impact – such as improving the help experience for millions of users.

About the team

At Web Platform, our mission is to drive Canva’s web product toward a scalable, high-performance architecture. We partner closely with product teams to build, innovate, and optimise core web capabilities—while also supporting their adoption at scale through education and strategic support.

Right now, we’re focused on:

  • Boosting product performance by exploring emerging technologies—such as smarter data loading, server-side rendering, and advanced caching strategies.
  • Building systems that enable confident, high-quality, and performance-aware code releases.
  • Optimising our bundling and delivery pipelines to ensure they scale seamlessly with Canva’s growing engineering organisation.

About the Role

As a Staff Frontend Engineer, you'll operate at the subgroup level, working across initiatives that span 3–4 platform teams, helping shape the direction of Canva’s web platform. You’ll have the opportunity to lead forward-looking projects, including:

  • Designing and delivering JavaScript-based RPC clients to power seamless communication between our frontend and backend systems.
  • Exploring the design and adoption of React Server Components, contributing to the evolution of Canva’s rendering architecture.
  • Shaping the future of our code bundling and delivery infrastructure, ensuring it scales with the needs of a growing product and engineering organisation.
  • Identifying the benefits and limitations of existing technologies, and guiding teams toward architectural decisions that unblock scale and improve developer experience.
  • Contributing high-level technical expertise and strategic direction to the development of tools that detect performance regressions before they reach production.

What's in it for you?

Achieving our crazy big goals motivates us to work hard - and we do - but you'll experience lots of moments of magic, connectivity and fun woven throughout life at Canva, too. We also offer a stack of benefits to set you up for every success in and outside of work.

Here's a taste of what's on offer:

  • Equity packages - we want our success to be yours too
  • Inclusive parental leave policy that supports all parents & carers
  • An annual Vibe & Thrive allowance to support your wellbeing, social connection, office setup & more
  • Flexible leave options that empower you to be a force for good, take time to recharge and supports you personally

Check out lifeatcanva.com for more info.

Other stuff to know

We make hiring decisions based on your experience, skills and passion, as well as how you can enhance Canva and our culture. When you apply, please tell us the pronouns you use and any reasonable adjustments you may need during the interview process.

Please note that interviews are conducted virtually. 

Similar Jobs

PwC - Senior Associate IT Assurance Services

PwC

Makati City, Metro Manila, Philippines (On-Site)
9 Months ago
SBM Management - Custodial Lead

SBM Management

Topeka, Kansas, United States (On-Site)
1 Month ago
PlayStation Global - Director, Software Engineering

PlayStation Global

Dublin, County Dublin, Ireland (On-Site)
2 Months ago
QuinStreet - Strategic Growth Associate

QuinStreet

United States (Remote)
1 Month ago
Tesla - Automotive Mechatronics Technician/Auto Mechanic

Tesla

Mannheim, Baden-Württemberg, Germany (On-Site)
4 Months ago
Devoteam - Cloud Native Exchange Platform Architect - M/F

Devoteam

Levallois-Perret, Île-de-France, France (On-Site)
1 Week ago
Simcorp - System Architect DevOps

Simcorp

Warsaw, Masovian Voivodeship, Poland (Hybrid)
3 Weeks ago
Epic Games - Senior Mobile Platform Engineer

Epic Games

Cary, North Carolina, United States (On-Site)
5 Months ago
USE Insider - Solutions Architect - Korea

USE Insider

Seoul, South Korea (Hybrid)
8 Months ago

Get notifed when new similar jobs are uploaded

Similar Skill Jobs

Universal Music Group - Administrative Assistant

Universal Music Group

Santa Monica, California, United States (On-Site)
4 Weeks ago
Goodbye Kansas Studios - Technology Support Technician (Mumbai)

Goodbye Kansas Studios

Mumbai, Maharashtra, India (On-Site)
4 Months ago
CME Group - ECHO Engineer

CME Group

Hong Kong (On-Site)
1 Month ago
Qualcomm - Senior Engineer - Windows/Linux kernel & Driver Development

Qualcomm

Hyderabad, Telangana, India (On-Site)
1 Month ago
Argus - Technical Artist

Argus

Calgary, Alberta, Canada (Remote)
3 Months ago
Toast - Staff Cloud Engineer

Toast

United States (Remote)
2 Weeks ago
Zeeco, Inc. - C&I Engineer

Zeeco, Inc.

Mumbai, Maharashtra, India (On-Site)
7 Months ago
bytedance - Head of Cloud Security Product Manager, APAC

bytedance

Singapore (On-Site)
3 Months ago
PwC - Security Operations Center and Incident Response Manager

PwC

Makati City, Metro Manila, Philippines (On-Site)
9 Months ago
Interactive Brokers - Tax Manager – International Tax Compliance

Interactive Brokers

Greenwich, Connecticut, United States (Hybrid)
1 Month ago

Get notifed when new similar jobs are uploaded

Jobs in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia

Pivotroots - Group Practice Head (AUTOMOTIVE)

Pivotroots

Melbourne, Victoria, Australia (Hybrid)
4 Weeks ago
Blue wire software - Mining Supervisor: Dragline

Blue wire software

Moura, Queensland, Australia (On-Site)
1 Week ago
Thales - Cloud Engineer

Thales

Barangaroo, New South Wales, Australia (Hybrid)
1 Month ago
Glitch production - Production Coordinator

Glitch production

Australia (On-Site)
1 Month ago
IION - Advertiser Success Manager / Customer Success Manager (ANZ)

IION

Sydney, New South Wales, Australia (Hybrid)
1 Month ago
Zenoti - Senior Product Support Specialist

Zenoti

Brisbane, Queensland, Australia (On-Site)
1 Month ago
lucas films - Mobility Specialist

lucas films

Sydney, New South Wales, Australia (On-Site)
2 Months ago
foxi ventures - Product Designer

foxi ventures

Adelaide, South Australia, Australia (On-Site)
1 Month ago
Octopus - Software Engineer - Cloud Authentication

Octopus

Australia (Remote)
2 Weeks ago
easygo - Software Quality Engineer

easygo

Melbourne, Victoria, Australia (Hybrid)
1 Month ago

Get notifed when new similar jobs are uploaded

Devops Jobs

Pay2 - Cloud Infrastructure Engineer (MLOps)

Pay2

Gurugram, India (On-Site)
1 Month ago
luxsoft - Senior/Lead DevOps Engineer

luxsoft

Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India (On-Site)
1 Week ago
bytedance - Site Reliability Engineer, Traffic Platform

bytedance

San Jose, California, United States (On-Site)
8 Months ago
CRB workforce  - VMware Cloud Foundation Engineer

CRB workforce

Houston, Texas, United States (Remote)
4 Weeks ago
high radius - Cloud Engineer - MySQL DBA

high radius

Hyderabad, Telangana, India (On-Site)
3 Days ago
Playgendary - DevOps (Cloud Engineer)

Playgendary

Limassol, Limassol, Cyprus (Remote)
4 Months ago
Rackner - Kubernetes Engineer

Rackner

United States (Remote)
1 Month ago
Ajmera Infotech - Android Developer II– Build Mission-Critical Health-Tech Apps

Ajmera Infotech

Hyderabad, Telangana, India (On-Site)
1 Month ago
Vercel - Engineering Manager, CI/CD

Vercel

San Francisco, California, United States (Hybrid)
4 Months ago

Get notifed when new similar jobs are uploaded

About The Company

Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand (Remote)

Austin, Texas, United States (Remote)

Sydney, New South Wales, Australia (Remote)

Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand (Remote)

Brisbane, Queensland, Australia (Remote)

Sydney, New South Wales, Australia (Remote)

Austin, Texas, United States (On-Site)

Austin, Texas, United States (Remote)

Austin, Texas, United States (Remote)

View All Jobs

Get notified when new jobs are added by Canva