About this role.
Supabase is hiring a senior systems engineer to evolve OrioleDB, a next-generation PostgreSQL storage engine, for its managed Postgres platform. The role focuses on low-level C development across storage, indexing, replication, query execution, reliability testing, recovery, and performance tooling. The engineer will contribute suitable changes upstream to PostgreSQL core and participate in the public open-source review process. This is a fully remote role requiring meaningful overlap with Americas time zones and participation in production support and on-call work. Candidates need deep PostgreSQL internals expertise, database-engine experience, and at least eight years of production C systems programming experience.
Role DNA
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Job Complexity
5/5Pace & Pressure
4/5Autonomy Level
5/5Communication Load
5/5Salary analysis
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Core skills
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Sample interview questions
I would explain the affected subsystem, document its invariants and call paths, and design the change to preserve compatibility with the planner, executor, WAL, and recovery behavior. I would validate it using targeted regression tests, stress tests, performance benchmarks, and review feedback from maintainers.
I would first preserve artifacts such as core dumps, logs, WAL, configuration, and a reproducible workload. I would narrow the failure with assertions, sanitizers, fault injection, and bisection, then verify both crash recovery and data consistency before proposing a minimal, well-tested fix.
I would assess data layout, concurrency control, WAL volume, vacuum behavior, planner costing, memory use, build time, query latency, and recovery semantics. I would define workload-specific benchmarks and ensure the implementation has clear operational limits and observability.
I would separate broadly useful functionality from product-specific code, follow PostgreSQL coding and submission conventions, provide design rationale and tests, and submit a focused patch series for public review. I would respond constructively to pgsql-hackers feedback and iterate through commitfest review until the patch is ready or its scope is refined.
I would combine deterministic regression coverage with randomized and fuzz testing, fault injection, crash/restart testing, replication scenarios, and long-running stress workloads. I would also improve CI signal quality, monitoring, runbooks, and incident feedback loops so operational failures become reproducible test cases.
About Supabase
Supabase is the Postgres development platform, built by developers for developers. We provide a complete backend solution including Database, Auth, Storage, Edge Functions, Realtime, and Vector Search. All services are deeply integrated and designed for growth.
About the role
We’re looking for an engineer to drive the evolution of OrioleDB and its collaboration with the upstream PostgreSQL community. OrioleDB is a next-generation storage engine for PostgreSQL, and this role sits at the intersection of database internals, open source community work, and Supabase’s managed Postgres platform.
This role requires strong working overlap with Americas time zones due to production support and on-call responsibilities.
What you’ll work on
New OrioleDB features. Design and implement new capabilities in OrioleDB — for example, native index access methods (GiST, GIN, HNSW for pgvector), disaster recovery tooling, and other storage-engine-level features that expand what OrioleDB can do.
Stability. Strengthen OrioleDB’s reliability through deeper test coverage, fault injection, crash and recovery testing, and improvements to CI infrastructure. Ensure regressions are caught early and that OrioleDB behaves predictably under stress, replication, and failure scenarios.
Upstream collaboration. Contribute changes directly to PostgreSQL core. Part of OrioleDB lives as a patch on top of PostgreSQL — moving the right pieces upstream shrinks what we maintain ourselves and benefits the wider community. This happens through PostgreSQL’s open development process: the pgsql-hackers mailing list, public code review, and commitfests.
Supabase integration. Work with Supabase’s Postgres team to ensure OrioleDB fits naturally into Supabase’s managed offering and roadmap.
You Will:
Design, implement, and test new OrioleDB features and integrate them cleanly with PostgreSQL’s planner, executor, and surrounding subsystems.
Build out and maintain test infrastructure: regression suites, fuzzing, randomized testing, crash and recovery testing, and CI pipelines.
Identify and prepare patches suitable for upstreaming to PostgreSQL core.
Improve performance, resilience, monitoring, and operational tooling for production use.
Debug and resolve complex issues in low-level C code, including in storage, replication, indexing, and query execution paths.
Participate in design discussions, architecture reviews, and code reviews — both inside Supabase and in the PostgreSQL community.
Write clear technical documentation, design notes, and upstream proposals.
Contribute to troubleshooting, analyzing, supporting and maintaining OrioleDB in production deployments. This can include answering support ticket requests, an on-call rotation, and supporting our team members in troubleshooting and fixing live customer production databases.
You Are:
An existing PostgreSQL core contributor or have equivalent experience in Database internals.
An expert C programmer with 8+ years of production experience with focus on low-level systems programming
Deeply familiar with PostgreSQL’s codebase, build system, and extension APIs.
Have experience designing or implementing database storage engines, index structures, or query execution components.
Comfortable contributing to community‑driven, upstream open source projects.
Proficient in debugging and profiling complex C code in a database context.
Able to write clear technical documentation and explain design trade‑offs.
A strong communicator, committed to an open and collaborative development process.
What We Offer
Fully Remote
We hire globally. We believe you can do your best work from anywhere. There are no Supabase offices, but we provide a WeWork membership or co-working allowance you can use anywhere in the world.
ESOP
Every team member receives ESOP (equity ownership) in the company. We want everyone to share in the upside of what we’re building together.
Tech Allowance
Use this budget to set up your ideal work environment—laptop, monitor, headphones, or whatever helps you do your best work.
Health Benefits
Supabase covers 100% of health insurance for employees and 80% for dependents, wherever you are. Your wellbeing and your family’s health are important to us.
Annual Off-Sites
Once a year, the entire company gathers in a new city for a week of connection, collaboration, and fun. It’s a highlight of our year.
Flexible Work
We operate asynchronously and trust you to manage your own time. You know what needs to be done and when.
Professional Development
Every team member receives an annual education allowance to spend on learning—courses, books, conferences, or anything that supports your growth.
About the Team
Supabase was born-remote and open-source-first. We believe our globally distributed team is our secret weapon in building tools developers love.
~400 team members
60+ countries
20+ languages spoken
Over $1B raised (including our $500M Series F)
540,000+ community members
We move fast, build in public, and use what we ship. If it’s in your project, we probably use it in ours too. We believe deeply in the open-source ecosystem and strive to support—not replace—existing tools and communities.
Annual salary information is not provided for this position. Explore salary ranges for similar roles in our Salary Directory ›
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