At Cloudflare, we are on a mission to help build a better Internet. Today the company runs one of the world’s largest networks that powers millions of websites and other Internet properties for customers ranging from individual bloggers to SMBs to Fortune 500 companies. Cloudflare protects and accelerates any Internet application online without adding hardware, installing software, or changing a line of code. Internet properties powered by Cloudflare all have web traffic routed through its intelligent global network, which gets smarter with every request. As a result, they see significant improvement in performance and a decrease in spam and other attacks. Cloudflare was named to Entrepreneur Magazine’s Top Company Cultures list and ranked among the World’s Most Innovative Companies by Fast Company. 

We realize people do not fit into neat boxes. We are looking for curious and empathetic individuals who are committed to developing themselves and learning new skills, and we are ready to help you do that. We cannot complete our mission without building a diverse and inclusive team. We hire the best people based on an evaluation of their potential and support them throughout their time at Cloudflare. Come join us! 

Hiring will be focused on those residing within the greater Austin, TX metro area. It will be a hybrid role, with the expectation of 2 days per week in the office.

Systems Engineer, Network Protocols & Distributed Systems Location: London, Lisbon or Austin (Hybrid)

Join the team helping shape the future of the Internet. We’re building high-performance systems that handle a quarter of the Internet’s traffic. Our work influences open standards (like QUIC, MASQUE, and ECH), involves close collaboration with the IETF, and pushes the boundaries of what's possible in networking and security.

You don’t need to be an HTTP or cryptography expert to join — we’re looking for excellent engineers who love tough problems, want to learn deeply, and are excited to contribute to one of the most technically demanding areas of infrastructure.

What you’ll do

• Build and operate systems that terminate HTTP and TLS at Internet scale
• Migrate core infrastructure from NGINX to a next-gen Rust-based proxy
• Measure and improve protocol performance across real-world traffic
• Contribute to open source and industry standards
• Learn from and work alongside some of the leading engineers in this space

You might be a good fit if you:

• Have solid systems programming experience (Rust, C, or similar)
• Experience/understanding of HTTP/2, HTTP/3, QUIC, congestion control, or transport-layer protocols
• Thrive in complex technical domains and enjoy learning new things
• Care about building reliable, secure, and performant software
• Are motivated by impact — technical, operational, and on the Internet itself
• Come from a background that’s underrepresented in tech — we value diverse perspectives

Bonus

• Proven ability to scale systems under high throughput and low latency demands
• Experience driving architecture or protocol-level change in production systems
• Contributions to open standards or open source projects

What Makes Cloudflare Special?

We’re not just a highly ambitious, large-scale technology company. We’re a highly ambitious, large-scale technology company with a soul. Fundamental to our mission to help build a better Internet is protecting the free and open Internet.

Project Galileo: Since 2014, we've equipped more than 2,400 journalism and civil society organizations in 111 countries with powerful tools to defend themselves against attacks that would otherwise censor their work, technology already used by Cloudflare’s enterprise customers--at no cost.

Athenian Project: In 2017, we created the Athenian Project to ensure that state and local governments have the highest level of protection and reliability for free, so that their constituents have access to election information and voter registration. Since the project, we've provided services to more than 425 local government election websites in 33 states.

1.1.1.1: We released 1.1.1.1 to help fix the foundation of the Internet by building a faster, more secure and privacy-centric public DNS resolver. This is available publicly for everyone to use - it is the first consumer-focused service Cloudflare has ever released. Here’s the deal - we don’t store client IP addresses never, ever. We will continue to abide by our privacy commitment and ensure that no user data is sold to advertisers or used to target consumers.

Sound like something you’d like to be a part of? We’d love to hear from you!

This position may require access to information protected under U.S. export control laws, including the U.S. Export Administration Regulations. Please note that any offer of employment may be conditioned on your authorization to receive software or technology controlled under these U.S. export laws without sponsorship for an export license.

Cloudflare is proud to be an equal opportunity employer.  We are committed to providing equal employment opportunity for all people and place great value in both diversity and inclusiveness.  All qualified applicants will be considered for employment without regard to their, or any other person's, perceived or actual race, color, religion, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, age, physical or mental disability, medical condition, family care status, or any other basis protected by law. We are an AA/Veterans/Disabled Employer.

Cloudflare provides reasonable accommodations to qualified individuals with disabilities.  Please tell us if you require a reasonable accommodation to apply for a job. Examples of reasonable accommodations include, but are not limited to, changing the application process, providing documents in an alternate format, using a sign language interpreter, or using specialized equipment.  If you require a reasonable accommodation to apply for a job, please contact us via e-mail at hr@cloudflare.com or via mail at 101 Townsend St. San Francisco, CA 94107.