Principal Software Engineer - Postgres

USD 140,000-232,000 per year
SENIOR
✅ Remote

Used Tools & Technologies

Not specified

Required Skills & Competences

Leadership @ 4 Mentoring @ 4 PostgreSQL @ 7 Performance Optimization @ 4 Rust @ 8 Technical Leadership @ 4 TAG @ 4 Observability @ 4 AI @ 4 ClickHouse @ 4

Details

Recognized on the 2025 Forbes Cloud 100 list, ClickHouse is a fast-growing private cloud company focused on real-time analytics, data warehousing, observability, and AI workloads. The company has more than 3,000 customers and rapidly growing ARR.

About the Role

ClickHouse is expanding capabilities in database systems and building next-generation infrastructure focused on performance, scalability, and developer experience. This strategic, high-impact role is for a Principal Engineer with deep expertise in systems programming and database internals—particularly Postgres. The role involves shaping critical components of the data platform, mentoring engineers, and driving architectural direction for systems that serve massive workloads.

This position operates with significant autonomy and ownership and involves work across storage, performance optimization, distributed coordination, and extension development.

Responsibilities

  • Lead design and implementation of advanced systems features across storage, replication, query execution, and performance optimization.
  • Contribute to and extend Postgres internals to improve reliability, scalability, and efficiency.
  • Prototype and build Postgres extensions that expand core capabilities and integrate with cloud-native infrastructure.
  • Collaborate with product, infrastructure, and cloud platform teams to deliver developer-friendly experiences.
  • Profile and optimize database performance using low-level instrumentation and benchmarking.
  • Provide technical leadership, set engineering standards, and mentor senior engineers.
  • Drive projects from concept to production with significant autonomy.

Requirements

  • 10+ years of experience building systems software in C/C++ or Rust (Go experience a plus).
  • Deep knowledge of PostgreSQL or other database engine internals (storage, execution, replication subsystems).
  • Strong understanding of concurrency, operating systems, and performance engineering.
  • Proven ability to ship large-scale systems or core infrastructure features end-to-end.
  • Experience contributing to open-source databases or similar complex systems is highly desirable.
  • Pragmatic problem solver with a bias for simplicity and measurable impact; thrives in a high-autonomy, high-velocity environment.

Compensation

  • The typical starting salary for this role in the United States is $140,000 - $200,000 USD.
  • The typical starting salary for this role in US Premium Markets (e.g., San Francisco Bay Area, New York City Metro) is $158,000 - $232,000 USD.

These ranges reflect the minimum and maximum pay for this role at the time of posting and may vary by candidate factors (education, experience, location, etc.).

Perks

  • Flexible work environment; ClickHouse is globally distributed and remote-friendly.
  • Employer contributions towards healthcare.
  • Equity: new team members receive stock options.
  • Flexible time off in the US; generous entitlement in other countries.
  • $500 home office setup for remote employees.
  • Global company-wide gatherings/offsites.

Culture & Equal Opportunity

  • Work in a small, high-talent team that values depth, craftsmanship, and impact.
  • ClickHouse provides equal employment opportunities and prohibits discrimination of any type.

Other Notes

  • Role is listed with the tag "LI-remote" and the company states it is remote-friendly and operates in over 20 countries.