Backend Engineer, Go

About the role

Our backend is the quiet machinery that makes thump! reliable — RSVPs, lobbies, waitlists, the BPM trust score, recommendations, notifications, and moderation. We care about clear primitives, small services, and APIs that are pleasant to use a year from now.

You'll work closely with mobile and with the people who actually run games on the platform every weekend, so the feedback loop between code and reality is short.

What you'll do

• Design, build, and operate Go services that power core thump! features.
• Own data models and APIs for RSVPs, host tools, and the BPM trust score.
• Improve reliability, observability, and incident response across the backend.
• Partner with mobile on API contracts, pagination, and edge cases.
• Write thoughtful tests; care about correctness in concurrent and distributed code.
• Help shape platform standards as the team grows.

What we're looking for

• 4+ years of backend engineering experience shipping production services.
• Strong fluency in Go (or comparable systems language) and SQL.
• Solid understanding of HTTP APIs, authentication, queues, and relational databases (Postgres preferred).
• Comfortable being on-call for systems you own and improving them after incidents.
• Clear written communication and a bias toward simpler designs.

Bonus, but not required

• Experience with recommender systems, ranking, or trust/reputation signals.
• Experience with mobile-facing APIs and real-time messaging.
• Postgres tuning, schema migration, or data-platform experience.

Benefits and perks

• Meaningful equity in every full-time offer, explained clearly before you sign.
• Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision — premiums covered for you and dependents from day one.
• Four weeks PTO that we expect you to take, plus a company-wide week off in December.
• Real home-office stipend — chair, monitor, the works.
• Quarterly in-person team weeks, usually with a pickup game on the schedule.
• Monthly game stipend toward gear, court fees, and league dues.

Compensation

$170,000 – $215,000 / yr base salary, plus meaningful equity in every full-time offer.

Base salary range for U.S.-based candidates. Final offer depends on level, location, and experience. Includes meaningful equity. California pay range disclosed in compliance with SB 1162.

Equal opportunity and disclosures

thump! is an equal opportunity employer. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, disability status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law. We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations to qualified candidates and employees with disabilities — please contact contact@thumpapp.com if you need an accommodation during the application or interview process.

For roles open to California-based candidates, the salary range above is provided in compliance with California Labor Code § 432.3 (SB 1162). Final compensation depends on level, location, and experience, and includes equity and benefits as described.