# Software Engineer, Inference - Performance Optimization

**Company:** [OpenAI](https://hotfix.jobs/companies/openai)
**Location:** San Francisco, CA
**Role:** ML Engineering
**Salary:** $295k – $555k/yr
**Skills:** Performance Modeling, Profiling, Benchmarking, Distributed Systems, Model Inference, Hardware Optimization, Kernels, Accelerators, Networking, Fleet Scheduling
**Posted:** 2026-04-25

> Models inference performance across application, model, and fleet layers using microbenchmarks to build cost-to-serve estimates. Analyzes workloads end-to-end, enhances bottleneck detection tools, and collaborates on optimizations for latency, throughput, and cost.

## Job Description

## Responsibilities
- Build and refine performance models that translate microbenchmark results into cost-to-serve estimates.
- Analyze inference workloads end to end across applications, models, and fleet infrastructure.
- Enhance tooling to identify bottlenecks across layers for latency and throughput.
- Partner with other teams to turn performance insights into concrete improvements and project how future changes affect inference.

## Requirements
- Enjoy reasoning from first principles about distributed systems, model inference, and hardware efficiency.
- Comfortable working across abstraction layers, from application behavior to kernels, accelerators, networking, and fleet scheduling.
- Deep expertise with performance profiling, benchmarking, analysis, and optimization.
- Enjoy collaborating with engineering and research teams to improve real production systems.

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**Canonical:** https://hotfix.jobs/jobs/0f2ff1a5-79fe-4fe9-ad20-d84aec238f5e