Software Engineer - AI Platforms and Products

About the Role

The New York Times is hiring a Software Engineer to join the New A.I. Products & Platforms mission. We are a team building the next generation of reader-facing A.I. experiences for one of the world's most trusted news organizations.

We're looking for a prototyper: someone who moves fast, ships real things, and has a genuine instinct for what makes a product feel good. You'll work at the intersection of applied A.I. and consumer product. You'll turn emerging capabilities — language models, content embeddings, semantic search — into features that help Times readers discover, understand, and engage more deeply with our content. You'll be working inside an organization with a strong culture of editorial judgment and independence.

You need a track record of shipping, a strong command of the modern web stack, and real hands-on time building with LLMs in production.

This is a hybrid role based in our New York City headquarters, reporting to the VP of Engineering, New AI Products and Platforms. You can typically expect to come into the office 2+ days per week.

 

Responsibilities:

• Prototype, iterate, and ship LLM- and embedding-powered reader experiences from early concept through production, in conjunction with other engineers and cross-functional peers

• Build across the full stack: Node.js/TypeScript backends, React frontends, and A.I. integrations connecting them

• Build net-new A.I. features and integrate them into existing Times systems and APIs — knowing when to build from scratch and when to wire things together cleanly

• Write, test, and refine prompts and retrieval pipelines; treat prompt engineering as a first-class engineering discipline

• Instrument your features with evaluations, engagement signals, and performance monitoring, and use them to make things better

• Work closely with product managers, designers, journalists, and senior engineers to translate editorial goals into working product

• Contribute to shared practices around evaluation, responsible A.I. use, and what "good" looks like inside an organization where judgment and independence are taken seriously

• Demonstrate support and understanding of our value of journalistic independence and a strong commitment to our mission to seek the truth and help people understand the world

 

Basic Qualifications:

• 2+ years of software engineering experience with demonstrated ability to ship consumer-facing features

• Hands-on experience building with Large Language Models in a real product context — not just side projects

• Full-stack fundamentals: Node.js or TypeScript on the backend, React on the front end

• Experience navigating codebases and working within established backend infrastructure

• Proficiency in GenAI‑assisted