Staff Software Engineer, Backend - job 1 of 2

The Company

PayPal has been revolutionizing commerce globally for more than 25 years. Creating innovative experiences that make moving money, selling, and shopping simple, personalized, and secure, PayPal empowers consumers and businesses in approximately 200 markets to join and thrive in the global economy. 

We operate a global, two-sided network at scale that connects hundreds of millions of merchants and consumers. We help merchants and consumers connect, transact, and complete payments, whether they are online or in person. PayPal is more than a connection to third-party payment networks. We provide proprietary payment solutions accepted by merchants that enable the completion of payments on our platform on behalf of our customers.

We offer our customers the flexibility to use their accounts to purchase and receive payments for goods and services, as well as the ability to transfer and withdraw funds. We enable consumers to exchange funds more safely with merchants using a variety of funding sources, which may include a bank account, a PayPal or Venmo account balance, PayPal and Venmo branded credit products, a credit card, a debit card, certain cryptocurrencies, or other stored value products such as gift cards, and eligible credit card rewards.  Our PayPal, Venmo, and Xoom products also make it safer and simpler for friends and family to transfer funds to each other. We offer merchants an end-to-end payments solution that provides authorization and settlement capabilities, as well as instant access to funds and payouts. We also help merchants connect with their customers, process exchanges and returns, and manage risk. We enable consumers to engage in cross-border shopping and merchants to extend their global reach while reducing the complexity and friction involved in enabling cross-border trade. 

Our beliefs are the foundation for how we conduct business every day.  We live each day guided by our core values of Inclusion, Innovation, Collaboration, and Wellness. Together, our values ensure that we work together as one global team with our customers at the center of everything we do – and they push us to ensure we take care of ourselves, each other, and our communities.

Job Summary:

We are looking for a talented and experienced Staff Software Engineer to join our engineering team. In this role, you will design, build, and scale web applications and services that power PayPal's commerce and payments ecosystem. You will work across the full stack — from crafting intuitive, high-performance user interfaces to building robust, secure backend services — while collaborating with cross-functional partners in product, design, and platform engineering.

Job Description:

Essential Responsibilities:

• Acts as a project or system leader, coordinating the activities of other engineers on the project or within the system
• Determines the technical tasks that other engineers will follow
• Actions result in the achievement of customer, operational, program or service objectives
• Proactively improves existing structures & processes
• Exercises judgement in reconciling diverse and competing priorities (time, quality, complexity risk) to identify optimal solutions to problems
• Notices patterns and condenses repetition into densely meaningful generalized solutions
• Collaborates with management to set/improve standards for engineering rigor
• Trusted to represent PayPal, Inc to the outside world via interactions with partners, customers, or industry organizations

Minimum Qualifications:

• 5+ years relevant experience and a Bachelor’s degree OR Any equivalent combination of education and experience.

Responsibilities

• Design, develop, and maintain scalable fullstack web applications using Node.js, React, and related JavaScript technologies.

• Lead the architecture and implementation of new features, from UI components to RESTful or GraphQL APIs.

• Write clean, well-tested, and maintainable code with a strong emphasis on performance, reliability, and security.

• Partner with product managers, designers, and data scientists to translate business requirements into technical solutions.

• Drive technical design reviews, participate in code reviews, and mentor junior engineers.

• Champion engineering best practices including CI/CD, test-driven development, and observability.

• Contribute to PayPal's internal developer tools, shared libraries, and platform infrastructure.

• Identify and address performance bottlenecks, scalability gaps, and technical debt.

• Collaborate with global teams across multiple time zones in an agile development environment.

Required Qualifications

• 5–8+ years of professional software engineering experience with a focus on JavaScript/TypeScript.

• Strong proficiency in React (hooks, context, performance optimization) and modern frontend tooling (Webpack, Vite, ESBuild).

• Deep expertise in Node.js for building scalable backend services, REST APIs, and/or GraphQL APIs.

• Solid understanding of web fundamentals: HTML5, CSS3, browser rendering, accessibility (WCAG), and web security (OWASP Top 10).

• Experience with relational or NoSQL databases (e.g., PostgreSQL, MySQL, MongoDB, Redis).

• Proficiency with cloud infrastructure concepts (AWS, GCP, or Azure) and containerization (Docker, Kubernetes).

• Hands-on experience with CI/CD pipelines, automated testing frameworks (Jest, Mocha, Cypress, Playwright), and observability tools.

• Strong understanding of software design patterns, distributed systems, and microservices architecture.

• Excellent communication and collaboration skills; able to articulate complex technical concepts to diverse audiences.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with TypeScript at scale in a large production codebase.

• Familiarity with payments, fintech, or e-commerce domains.

• Contributions to open-source JavaScript projects.

• Experience with GraphQL Federation, micro-frontends, or edge computing patterns.

• Knowledge of A/B testing frameworks, feature flagging systems, and experimentation platforms.

• Prior experience mentoring engineers or leading a technical pod/squad.

Subsidiary:

PayPal

Travel Percent:

0

-

The base pay for this role will depend on where you work and the relevant experience and expertise you bring. The expected range of pay for this role by location is:

Primary Location | Pay Range:

San Jose, California | ($176,500.00 - $262,350.00 Annually)

Additional Location(s) | Pay Range:

No other locations are assigned to this requisition currently.

Additional compensation for this role may include an annual performance bonus, equity, or other incentive compensation, as applicable.

PayPal does not charge candidates any fees for courses, applications, resume reviews, interviews, background checks, or onboarding. When making an application directly, we will never ask you to share passwords, one-time passcodes (OTP), or verification codes.  Any such request is a red flag and likely part of a scam. All communication regarding your application will come from official PayPal email domains. If you suspect fraudulent activity, please report it immediately.  To learn more about how to identify and avoid recruitment fraud please visit https://careers.pypl.com/contact-us. 

For the majority of employees, PayPal's balanced hybrid work model offers 3 days in the office for effective in-person collaboration and 2 days at your choice of either the PayPal office or your home workspace, ensuring that you equally have the benefits and conveniences of both locations.

Our Benefits:

At PayPal, we’re committed to building an equitable and inclusive global economy. And we can’t do this without our most important asset-you. That’s why we offer comprehensive, choice-based programs, to support all aspects of personal wellbeing—physical, emotional, and financial—delivering meaningful value where it matters most. We strive to create a flexible, balanced work culture with a holistic approach to benefits, including generous paid time off, healthcare coverage for you and your family, and resources to create financial security and support your mental health.

Who We Are:

Click Here to learn more about our culture and community.

Commitment to Diversity and Inclusion 

PayPal provides equal employment opportunity (EEO) to all persons regardless of age, color, national origin, citizenship status, physical or mental disability, race, religion, creed, gender, sex, pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender identity and/or expression, genetic information, marital status, status with regard to public assistance, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state, or local law.  In addition, PayPal will provide reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities.  If you are unable to submit an application because of incompatible assistive technology or a disability, please contact us at paypalglobaltalentacquisition@paypal.com.

Belonging at PayPal: 

Our employees are central to advancing our mission, and we strive to create an environment where everyone can do their best work with a sense of purpose and belonging. Belonging at PayPal means creating a workplace with a sense of acceptance and security where all employees feel included and valued. We are proud to have a diverse workforce reflective of the merchants, consumers, and communities that we serve, and we continue to take tangible actions to cultivate inclusivity and belonging at PayPal.

Any general requests for consideration of your skills, please Join our Talent Community.

We know the confidence gap and imposter syndrome can get in the way of meeting spectacular candidates. Please don’t hesitate to apply.