Low-level Senior Software Engineer, Xet Storage
- Role
- Backend
- Experience
- Senior
- Employment
- Full-time
Open to Anywhere in EMEA + US · Prefers France. Set where you work from to check your eligibility.
The listing prefers candidates in France.
No BS summary
Senior low-level software engineer with 8+ years building distributed systems, storage, or networking infrastructure. Needs proficiency in a low-level systems language, with Rust strongly preferred, and comfort working independently in async fully remote EMEA environment.
Core skills
Required skills
Optional skills
At Hugging Face, we're on a journey to democratize good AI. We are building the fastest growing platform for AI builders with over 11 million users who collectively shared over 4 million models, 1 million datasets & 1.5 million Gradio apps. Our open-source libraries have more than 700,000 stars on Github. About the Role Roles at Hugging Face are very fluid and dynamic -- we're looking for someone who is comfortable taking on different challenges that evolve over time. This role sits on the Xet Storage team, the group responsible for the storage system behind all of Hugging Face. Today we store over 200PB (and growing rapidly!) of the world's most important ML & AI assets. Xet is the underlying storage architecture for the entire Hugging Face platform and community -- from the largest model repositories to the datasets and Spaces that millions of people build on every day. In this role, you'll work across two closely connected surfaces. You'll contribute to xet-core , our open-source project written in Rust that powers hf-xet -- the Python library underpinning the Hugging Face Hub client and the wider ecosystem of open-source tools the community relies on. And you'll design, build, and operate meaningful and challenging features in the Xet Storage backend, contributing to the broader Infrastructure organization at Hugging Face. We're a small team building and operating incredible things at enormous scale, in a high-trust, low-process, async, and remote environment -- and we lean heavily on the latest AI tools to move fast. If you love writing low-level, high-performance code and are energized by the challenge of large-scale, scalable services, this is the team for you. This usually means proven experience building and operating production systems software, but we consider every applicant on an individual basis. Requirements What we're looking for 8+ years building and scaling distributed systems, storage, or networking infrastructure. Proficiency in a low-level systems language, with Rust strongly preferred (we also work in Python, Typescript, Go, and C++ across the stack). A track record of working independently in a high-trust, low-process environment -- you're comfortable with ambiguity and take ownership end to end. Comfort operating in a fast-moving, async, and fully remote environment. A passion for building simple, robust, and scalable systems relied on by engineering and science teams around the world. Bonus points if you have Experience designing efficient, high-performance, fault-tolerant data storage and retrieval systems. Experience operating production systems -- monitoring, alerting, and distributed debugging and recovery. Familiarity with git internals, cloud infrastructure (AWS, Azure, GCP, Kubernetes), databases (relational and non-relational), or networking. About You If you love open-source, are excited by the intersection of low-level performance work and large-scale services, and want your code to sit at the foundation of the world's largest platform for AI builders, then we can't wait to see your application! If you're interested in joining us, but don't tick every box above, we still encourage you to apply! We're building a diverse team whose skills, experiences, and backgrounds complement one another. We're happy to consider where you might be able to make the biggest impact. One more thing At Hugging Face we believe great AI shouldn't require a massive cluster, we build for everyone, especially the GPU-poor. And because we read every application, here's a small sign that you read this one too: start your answer to the first application question with the words “ GPU-poor and proud 🤗”. No trick, no catch, it just tells us a real person is on the other side. Benefits More about Hugging Face We are actively working to build a culture that values diversity, equity, and inclusivity . We are intentionally building a workplace where people feel respected and supported—regardless of who you are or where you come from. We believe this is foundational to building a great company and community. Hugging Face is an equal opportunity employer and we do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status. We value development. You will work with some of the smartest people in our industry. We are an organization that has a bias for impact and is always challenging ourselves to continuously grow. We provide all employees with reimbursement for relevant conferences, training, and education. We care about your well-being. We offer flexible working hours and remote options. We offer health, dental, and vision benefits for employees and their dependents. We also offer parental leave and flexible paid time off. We support our employees wherever they are . While we have office spaces in NYC and Paris, we're very distributed and all remote employees have the opportunity to visit our offices. If needed, we'll also outfit your workstation to ensure you succeed. We want our teammates to be shareholders . All employees have company equity as part of their compensation package. If we succeed in becoming a category-defining platform in machine learning and artificial intelligence, everyone enjoys the upside. We support the community . We believe major scientific advancements are the result of collaboration across the field. Join a community supporting the ML/AI community.
What you'll do
- Contribute to xet-core, the open-source project written in Rust that powers hf-xet.
- Design, build, and operate meaningful and challenging features in the Xet Storage backend.
- Contribute to the broader Infrastructure organization at Hugging Face.
- Work across low-level performance code and large-scale, scalable services.
- Work on low-level, high-performance code and large-scale, scalable services.
- Contribute to xet-core, the open-source Rust project powering Xet Storage and hf-xet.
- Design, build, and operate meaningful features in the Xet Storage backend.
- Work across the Rust core and the Python client surfaces (hf-xet).
- Contribute to the broader Infrastructure organization to operate storage at large scale.
- Contribute to xet-core, the open-source Rust project powering hf-xet.
- Design, build, and operate features in the Xet Storage backend.
- Work across the xet-core (Rust) surface and the hf-xet (Python) client surface.
- Operate and maintain large-scale storage systems (hundreds of PB) in production.
- Work in a high-trust, low-process, async, remote environment.
- Contribute to xet-core, the open-source Rust project that powers hf-xet.
- Work across the xet-core surface and the Xet Storage backend within the Infrastructure organization.
- Build and operate high-performance, large-scale production systems.
- Contribute to xet-core, the open-source Rust project that powers hf-xet
- Design, build and operate features in the Xet Storage backend
- Build and operate production systems software for large-scale storage (200PB+)
- Work in a small, remote, async team with ownership end-to-end
What they require
- 8+ years building and scaling distributed systems, storage, or networking infrastructure.
- Proficiency in a low-level systems language, with Rust strongly preferred.
- A track record of working independently in a high-trust, low-process environment -- you're comfortable with ambiguity and take ownership end to end.
- Comfort operating in a fast-moving, async, and fully remote environment.
- A passion for building simple, robust, and scalable systems relied on by engineering and science teams around the world.
- Preferred: Experience designing efficient, high-performance, fault-tolerant data storage and retrieval systems.
- Preferred: Experience operating production systems -- monitoring, alerting, and distributed debugging and recovery.
- Preferred: Familiarity with git internals, cloud infrastructure (AWS, Azure, GCP, Kubernetes), databases (relational and non-relational), or networking.
- Love open-source.
- Excited by the intersection of low-level performance work and large-scale services.
- Start your answer to the first application question with the words “GPU-poor and proud 🤗”.
- If you love open-source, are excited by the intersection of low-level performance work and large-scale services, and want your code to sit at the foundation of the world's largest platform for AI builders, then we can't wait to see your application.
- Proven experience building and operating production systems software.
- Experience writing low-level, high-performance code.
- Experience working on storage or large-scale distributed systems.
- Comfortable writing low-level, high-performance code.
- Proficiency in a low-level systems language (Rust strongly preferred).
- Track record of working independently in a high-trust, low-process environment.
- 8+ years building and scaling distributed systems, storage, or networking infrastructure
- Proficiency in a low-level systems language (Rust strongly preferred)
- Track record of working independently in a high-trust, low-process environment
- Comfort operating in a fast-moving, async, and fully remote environment
- Preferred: experience designing efficient, high-performance, fault-tolerant data storage and retrieval systems; production operations (monitoring, alerting, distributed debugging)
Benefits
- Reimbursement for relevant conferences, training, and education.
- Flexible working hours and remote options.
- Health, dental, and vision benefits for employees and their dependents.
- Parental leave.
- Flexible paid time off.
- Office spaces in NYC and Paris.
- All remote employees have the opportunity to visit our offices.
- If needed, we'll also outfit your workstation to ensure you succeed.
- All employees have company equity as part of their compensation package.
- Join a community supporting the ML/AI community.
- We provide all employees with reimbursement for relevant conferences, training, and education.
- You will work with some of the smartest people in our industry.
- We offer flexible working hours and remote options.
- We offer health, dental, and vision benefits for employees and their dependents.
- We also offer parental leave and flexible paid time off.
- While we have office spaces in NYC and Paris, we're very distributed and all remote employees have the opportunity to visit our offices.
- Equity as part of compensation.
- Parental leave and flexible paid time off.
- Health, dental, and vision benefits for employees and their dependents
- Parental leave and flexible paid time off
- Equity for employees as part of compensation
- Reimbursement for relevant conferences, training, and education
- Flexible working hours and remote options; opportunity to visit offices
Hugging Face is building a platform for AI builders, including the Hugging Face Hub, open-source libraries, models, datasets, Spaces, and Gradio apps.