Waymo is an autonomous driving technology company with the mission to be the world's most trusted driver. Since its start as the Google Self-Driving Car Project in 2009, Waymo has focused on building the Waymo Driver—The World's Most Experienced Driver™—to improve access to mobility while saving thousands of lives now lost to traffic crashes. The Waymo Driver powers Waymo’s fully autonomous ride-hail service and can also be applied to a range of vehicle platforms and product use cases. The Waymo Driver has provided over ten million rider-only trips, enabled by its experience autonomously driving over 100 million miles on public roads and tens of billions in simulation across 15+ U.S. states.
The Simulator Team at Waymo builds state-of-the-art simulations of realistic environments for testing and training the Waymo Driver. Your team will be a diverse, and collaborative group of machine learning (ML) engineers, software engineers and data scientists. We develop industry-leading simulation solutions using advanced ML algorithms that measure and enhance the performance of the Waymo Driver. We achieve those goals by jointly modeling the real world, including realistic agents (vehicles, pedestrians, cyclists, motorcyclists), roads, traffic control systems, and weather conditions, and the full sensor suite including camera, Lidar and radars.
To increase the fidelity, scalability and controllability of our simulations,we employ the latest ML technologies such as large language models, foundational world models, and reconstructive methods trained on large-scale datasets with both generative and reconstructive technologies, as well as traditional rendering approaches.
In this hybrid role, you will report to a Senior Staff Engineering Manager.
You will:
Work closely with onboard and research engineers to scale simulation and enable critical Waymo milestones
Support development, testing and evolution of mapping data in the simulator
Improve / monitor the performance, scalability and the reliability of the simulator
Design the long term architecture to fit the product to an increasing number of internal customers
You have:
Hands-on experience building a popular (internal or external-facing) product
5+ years of experience with backend knowledge such as workflows, databases, SQL, production monitoring, etc
Strong in C++
We prefer:
Experience with the release of software in a highly distributed heterogeneous execution environment
Experience with systems programming (game engines, database, OS, distributed)
Experience with ML
#LI-Hybrid
The expected base salary range for this full-time position across US locations is listed below. Actual starting pay will be based on job-related factors, including exact work location, experience, relevant training and education, and skill level. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range for the role location or, if the role can be performed remote, the specific salary range for your preferred location, during the hiring process.
Waymo employees are also eligible to participate in Waymo’s discretionary annual bonus program, equity incentive plan, and generous Company benefits program, subject to eligibility requirements.
Skills Required
- 5+ years of experience with backend knowledge
- Hands-on experience building a popular product
- Strong in C++
Waymo Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Waymo and has not been reviewed or approved by Waymo.
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Fair & Transparent Compensation — Pay is considered strong for full‑time technical roles, aligning with top‑tier AV/Big Tech benchmarks. Employer materials also emphasize competitive pay with eligibility for bonuses and equity as part of total rewards.
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Healthcare Strength — Coverage spans medical, dental, vision, mental‑health resources, onsite wellness centers, and counseling, with specialized programs such as menopause and transgender medical advocacy. Dependents are included, indicating depth across core health needs.
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Parental & Family Support — Offerings include fertility and family‑forming assistance, parental and baby‑bonding leave, caregiver and elder‑care support, and backup childcare. These programs are positioned to support families through multiple life stages.
Waymo Insights
What We Do
Waymo is an autonomous driving technology company with a mission to make it safe and easy for people and things to move around. With the Waymo Driver, we can improve the world’s mobility while saving thousands of lives. Waymo reaches out to candidates from official channels only (e.g. directly from @waymo.com email addresses, or through our recruiters or sourcers who are noted as such on LinkedIn). We do not contact candidates about career opportunities through instant messaging apps like Telegram, email addresses from domains other than waymo.com (such as Gmail addresses), direct messages on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram, or text messages. Visit waymo.com to check out our official job listings.
