Database Engineer — Storage & Query Execution

What we do ParadeDB is a Postgres-native alternative to Elasticsearch. We build state-of-the-art search (full-text, vector, and hybrid) and columnar analytics as a Postgres extension. Companies like Modern Treasury, BILT Rewards, Alibaba Cloud, and many others use ParadeDB to:

• Eliminate ETL/change data capture tools
• Add transactional guarantees to their search indexes
• Perform JOINs on their search data
• Unify their search & transactional stack for agentic workloads

We're a small, focused team of engineers dedicated to creating an inclusive and enjoyable work environment. We’re primarily distributed across the United States and Canada, with a small office in San Francisco. We’re a Series A company with a flat structure, strong backing from investors, and plenty of room for growth. What we want We're looking for a database engineer to join our team full-time. The ideal candidate should have:

• A solid foundation in database systems and internals
• Meaningful experience working on databases, query engines, storage engines, indexing systems, or similarly complex infrastructure software
• Proficiency in systems programming with C/C++/Rust/Zig and the ability to navigate large, complex codebases effectively (bonus points for Rust)
• Experience designing, profiling, optimizing, and debugging systems with a focus on performance, scalability, and maintainability
• Experience with Postgres internals, database extensions, or related systems is a plus
• Familiarity with query optimization, vectorized execution, columnar storage, or analytical query processing is a plus
• Familiarity with search systems is a plus
• Familiarity with technologies such as Tantivy, Apache DataFusion, Arrow, Parquet, or pgrx is a plus
• Contributions to high-quality open-source projects are a plus
• Prior experience at a small, high-performing startup is a plus

We're seeking someone creative, independent, and excited by difficult technical challenges. You'll bring thoughtful opinions, learn quickly, engage directly with customers, and help us build a world-class product. What you want

• You want to be part of the core team of a fast-growing infrastructure startup
• You want to wear many hats and interface directly with customers
• You’re passionate about databases, query engines, search technologies, and data systems
• You’re excited about diving deep into the internals of Postgres and writing high-performance, safe Rust code
• You’re excited to build state-of-the-art search and analytical capabilities on top of Postgres
• You’re excited to learn about, draw inspiration from, and contribute to systems like Tantivy, Apache DataFusion, PostgreSQL, Parquet, and Arrow
• You believe in open-source and want to contribute to building a sustainable open-source business
• You want autonomy over your work and the opportunity to make impactful design decisions

What you'll do

• Develop and optimize the ParadeDB PostgreSQL extension using Postgres APIs via pgrx
• Build features that interface with Postgres storage, indexing, query planning, query execution, and extension infrastructure
• Work with the internals of Tantivy, Apache DataFusion, and other open-source systems to implement new search and analytics capabilities
• Contribute upstream to Tantivy, DataFusion, and our other dependencies
• Design and implement efficient data structures and algorithms for search and analytical workloads
• Optimize query performance and resource utilization using profiling tools
• Contribute to the evolution of ParadeDB's search, analytics, indexing, and query processing capabilities
• Develop and maintain documentation, including API references and user guides
• Engage directly with our customers and the open-source community on GitHub and Slack
• Contribute to technical writing, product demos, and content marketing
• Help shape ParadeDB's product roadmap and technical direction

Official listing: https://paradedb.notion.site/