Google

Senior Staff Software Engineer, Video Playback, YouTube

Google$262K — $364K *
Media
8 - 10 years of experience
Job Overview by Ladders

Qualifications

  • Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or equivalent practical experience.
  • 10 years of experience in software engineering.
  • 3 years of experience in mobile engineering or mobile media.
  • Experience as a tech lead or formal mentor.
  • Familiarity with media-related products, such as video or music.
  • Experience in designing and operating large-scale systems.
  • Excellent communication skills for conveying technical concepts.

Responsibilities

  • Lead innovations in client media, integrating next-gen codecs and formats.
  • Enhance the mobile player architecture for optimal playback experiences across YouTube.
  • Conduct in-depth performance investigations to boost scalability.
  • Foster collaborations with YouTube Apps, Infrastructure, and industry partners.
  • Experiment with emerging technologies like generative AI.

Benefits

  • Access to a comprehensive health insurance package.
  • Retirement savings options with company matching.
  • Generous paid time off for personal and family needs.
  • Professional development opportunities and training.
  • Team-building events and a collaborative work culture.
Full Job Description
Minimum qualifications:
  • Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or equivalent practical experience.
  • 10 years of experience in software engineering.
  • 3 years of experience in mobile engineering (e.g., iOS or Android) or mobile media experience (e.g., codecs or graphics).

Preferred qualifications:
  • Experience as a tech lead, a formal mentor, or a go-to expert for a team.
  • Experience working with video, music, or other media-related products.
  • Experience in designing, building, and operating systems at large-scale.
  • Excellent communication skills with the ability to articulate technical concepts to audiences.


About the job

With your technical expertise you will manage project priorities, deadlines, and deliverables. You will design, develop, test, deploy, maintain, and enhance software solutions.

The YouTube Playback Experience team is responsible for video playback on all screens and critical to enable this core user journey.

In the role of Senior Staff Software Engineer for Mobile Video Playback, you will guide the team in advancing the entire player stack, from high-level APIs to leveraging hardware features. Your leadership will ensure performant and engaging experiences for both established formats like VOD, live, and DRM and emerging areas such as generative AI, multi-modal feeds, and vertical video. Additionally, you will drive client media innovation by utilizing on-device hardware like NPUs, GPUs, and codecs to introduce next-generation media formats and capabilities.

Individual pay is determined by factors including job-related skills, experience, and relevant education or training.

US: $262000 - $364000 (USD) 25% bonus target equity benefits

Learn more about benefits at Google .

Responsibilities
  • Lead client media innovation to bring next-generation codecs and formats (e.g., AV1/2, Spatial Audio) to users. Enable innovative video experiences by leveraging on-device GPU and NPU for advanced rendering effects while contributing to the advancement of networking and crypto stacks.
  • Evolve the mobile player architecture and platform to deliver the best playback experience across all YouTube products (Main, Music, Kids, YTV) and video formats (VOD, shorts, live, encrypted content).
  • Drive deep investigative work to unlock performance at scale.
  • Foster strong partnerships and technical collaboration with internal teams (YouTube Apps, Infrastructure, AOM, Android, Pixel) and industry partners (OEMs, SOCs, network operators, technical standards bodies).
  • Embrace and experiment with emerging technologies such as GenAI.


About Google

Google is a multinational technology company that specializes in Internet-related services and products. These include online advertising technologies, search engine, cloud computing, software, and hardware. Google was founded in 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they were Ph.D. students at Stanford University. The company has grown tremendously since then and has become one of the most valuable companies in the world. Google's mission is to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful.
Learn more about Google
Size
156,500 employees
Market Cap
$1,115.4 billion
Industry
Net Income
$40.2 billion
Founded
1998
5 Year Trend
+23.3%
Revenue
$182.5 billion
NASDAQ

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