What does a software engineer in san francisco earn?

SF compensation runs at the top end of the band. Founding engineer offers commonly clear $200k base + 0.5–2% equity at seed-to-Series-A. The typical band for a software engineer runs $120k–$200k base, equity at startups.

Are software engineer jobs in san francisco remote-friendly?

6 of the current 72 listings (8%) allow remote work; the rest are on-site or hybrid in San Francisco.

What companies hire software engineer jobs in san francisco?

Jobs Base aggregates listings across YC-backed startups, growth-stage companies, and selected larger companies hiring with builder-role characteristics.

What's the difference between a software engineer and a regular software engineer?

Jobs Base only lists builder roles. Positions where one person owns the product end-to-end. We filter out ticket-driven, narrowly-scoped roles even when the title matches. About 9% of listings scraped match this definition.

Software Engineer Jobs in San Francisco

San Francisco software engineer hiring is the most over-broadcast slice of the market. Most listings are not actually builder roles. Filtering on the LLM classifier brings the volume way down to companies under 50 people where the role is genuinely end-to-end. Compensation at builder-role SF startups commonly runs $180k–$220k base with meaningful equity. Expect 4–5 day in-office at most pre-seed and Series A companies.

72 active 8% remote median salary $227k

1.	Software Engineer (Cognition) San Francisco, California, United States \| From $260,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| mid \| python, distributed systems, ai \| 3w ago
2.	Software Engineer - AI Agents (LiveFlow) San Francisco, California, United States \| remote \| full-time \| mid \| ai agents, llm, workflow automation \| 3w ago
3.	Software Engineer (Column) San Francisco, California, United States \| on-site \| full-time \| mid \| infrastructure, backend, product \| 4w ago
4.	Software Engineer, Stablecoin (Slash) San Francisco, California, United States \| $200,000 – $300,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| senior \| full-stack development, api design, database migration \| 1mo ago
5.	Software Engineer (SF) (Fractional AI) San Francisco, California, United States \| $160,000 – $220,000/yr \| remote \| full-time \| senior \| software engineering, ai systems, system design \| 1mo ago
6.	Software Engineer, Agents (Benchling) San Francisco, California, United States \| $173,369 – $234,388/yr \| remote \| full-time \| entry \| python, react, llm \| 1mo ago
7.	Software Engineer (Latent) San Francisco, California, United States \| $200,000 – $285,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| mid \| typescript, distributed systems, postgresql \| 1mo ago
8.	Software Engineer - AI (NovusMinds AI) San Francisco, California, United States \| on-site \| full-time \| senior \| python, typescript, go \| 1mo ago
9.	Software Engineer, AI (Ruli) San Francisco, California, United States \| $110,000 – $200,000/yr \| hybrid \| full-time \| entry \| python, typescript, serverless \| 1mo ago
10.	Software Engineer - AI (WealthyMinds AI) San Francisco, California, United States \| on-site \| full-time \| entry \| python, fastapi, langchain \| 1mo ago
11.	Software Engineer, Growth (Slash) San Francisco, California, United States \| $350,000 – $550,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| mid \| software engineering, fintech, product development \| 1mo ago
12.	Software Engineer - Voice AI (Inference Runtime) (Baseten Labs) San Francisco, California, United States \| $165,000 – $330,000/yr \| remote \| full-time \| senior \| python, docker, kubernetes \| 1mo ago
13.	Software Engineer - Product (Mid to Senior) (Julius) San Francisco, California, United States \| $150,000 – $200,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| mid \| react, next.js, tailwind css \| 1mo ago
14.	Software Engineer - Product (New Grad) (Julius) San Francisco, California, United States \| $130,000 – $150,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| entry \| react, next.js, tailwind css \| 1mo ago
15.	Software Engineer (Conduit) San Francisco, California, United States \| $150,000 – $200,000/yr \| hybrid \| full-time \| senior \| python, django, svelte \| 1mo ago
16.	Software Engineer - Product (Mid to Senior) (Julius) San Francisco, California, United States \| $150,000 – $200,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| mid \| react, next.js, tailwind css \| 1mo ago
17.	Software Engineer ($180K - $220K + Equity) at YC-backed AI Data Infrastructure Startup (CoffeeSpace) San Francisco, California, United States \| $180,000 – $220,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| entry \| next.js, react, python \| 1mo ago
18.	Software Engineer (Founding) (Moe) San Francisco, California, United States \| hybrid \| full-time \| entry \| react native, typescript, aws lambda \| 1mo ago
19.	Software Engineer, Gen AI Platform (Abridge) San Francisco, California, United States \| $221,000 – $300,000/yr \| hybrid \| full-time \| entry \| python, java, go \| 1mo ago
20.	Software Engineer (ABC People) San Francisco, California, United States \| on-site \| full-time \| lead \| react, python, node.js \| 1mo ago
21.	Software Engineer (ShiftOS) San Francisco, California, United States \| $120,000 – $165,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| entry \| react, next.js, typescript \| 1mo ago
22.	Software Engineer – Frontend & UX Design (CompFly AI) San Francisco, California, United States \| $100,000 – $200,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| mid \| react, typescript, ux design \| 1mo ago
23.	Staff Software Engineer - Data Platform (Pave) San Francisco, California, United States+4 \| hybrid \| full-time \| senior \| data pipelines, platform infrastructure, integrations \| 1mo ago
24.	Staff Software Engineer, AI Operations (ŌURA) San Francisco, California, United States \| $233,000 – $267,000/yr \| hybrid \| full-time \| senior \| python, node.js, react \| 1mo ago
25.	Senior Software Engineer, AI Engineer (Midi Health) San Francisco, California, United States+1 \| $170,000 – $210,000/yr \| hybrid \| full-time \| senior \| python, llm, machine learning \| 1mo ago
26.	Senior Software Engineer, Data (Probably Genetic) San Francisco, California, United States \| $150,000 – $210,000/yr \| remote \| full-time \| senior \| python, sql, aws \| 1mo ago
27.	Senior Software Engineer - AI Products (Gem) San Francisco, California, United States \| $190,000 – $260,000/yr \| hybrid \| full-time \| senior \| llm, embedding models, search architecture \| 1mo ago
28.	Senior Software Engineer - AI Applications (Plaid) San Francisco, California, United States+2 \| $209,880 – $315,480/yr \| hybrid \| full-time \| senior \| html, css, javascript \| 1mo ago
29.	Senior Software Engineer (AI Agents) (Arcadia) San Francisco, California, United States \| hybrid \| full-time \| senior \| react, typescript, go \| 1mo ago
30.	Senior Software Engineer ($250K - $300K + Equity) at YC-backed AI Data Infrastructure Startup (CoffeeSpace) San Francisco, California, United States \| $250,000 – $300,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| senior \| next.js, react, node.js \| 1mo ago
31.	AI Agent Software Engineer - Claude Code, Codex or Cursor (Addison Group) San Francisco, California, United States \| $180,000 – $280,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| mid \| claude, codex, cursor \| 3w ago
32.	Founding Software Engineer (MIRA) San Francisco, California, United States \| on-site \| full-time \| lead \| llm, fine-tuning, retrieval-augmented generation (rag) \| 1mo ago
33.	Founding Software Engineer, Perception (Kovari Industries) San Francisco, California, United States \| on-site \| full-time \| lead \| c++, camera pipelines, computer vision \| 1mo ago
34.	Founding Software Engineer, Robot Learning (Kovari Industries) San Francisco, California, United States \| on-site \| full-time \| lead \| robotics, perception stack, sensor data \| 1mo ago
35.	Principal Software Engineer, Model LifeCycle (Crusoe) San Francisco, California, United States \| $260,000 – $326,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| lead \| llm, foundational models, model fine-tuning \| 1mo ago
36.	Full-Stack Software Engineer (New Grads) (Agave) San Francisco, California, United States \| $120,000 – $160,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| entry \| typescript, react, redis \| 1mo ago
37.	Full Stack Software Engineer (Gumloop) San Francisco, California, United States+1 \| $120,000 – $220,000/yr \| hybrid \| full-time \| senior \| python, typescript, react \| 1mo ago
38.	Senior/Staff Software Engineer, Product (Slash) San Francisco, California, United States \| $400,000 – $700,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| senior \| database schema, api design, backend development \| 1mo ago
39.	Senior / Staff Software Engineer (SF/NY) (Fractional AI) San Francisco, California, United States+1 \| $230,000 – $350,000/yr \| remote \| full-time \| senior \| software engineering, ai systems, system design \| 1mo ago
40.	Forward Deployed Software Engineer (Uplane) San Francisco, California, United States \| $150,000 – $200,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| entry \| react, next.js, vue.js \| 1mo ago
41.	Full-Stack Engineer (Cognition) San Francisco, California, United States \| $260,000 – $300,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| mid \| python, typescript, react \| 1mo ago
42.	Founding Engineer (Avent) San Francisco, California, United States \| $120,000 – $150,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| lead \| next.js, typescript, python \| 1mo ago
43.	Founding Engineer (Ventura) San Francisco, California, United States \| $140,000 – $220,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| lead \| nextjs, typescript, python \| 1mo ago
44.	Founding Engineer (Aurorin CAD) San Francisco, California, United States \| $100,000 – $150,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| lead \| systems programming, native applications, swift \| 1mo ago
45.	Founding Engineer (Effective AI) San Francisco, California, United States \| on-site \| full-time \| senior \| python, typescript, go \| 1mo ago
46.	Conductor (Conductor) San Francisco, United States \| on-site \| full-time \| senior \| 4w ago
47.	Senior Full Stack Engineer (MrBeast) San Francisco, California, United States+3 \| hybrid \| full-time \| senior \| react native, api development, data modeling \| 1mo ago
48.	AI Engineer- Gen AI/SWE- Weights & Biases (Weights & Biases) San Francisco, California, United States \| $188,000 – $275,000/yr \| hybrid \| full-time \| senior \| python, typescript, system design \| 1mo ago
49.	Founding Engineer (Kiloforge) San Francisco, United States \| on-site \| full-time \| lead \| 4w ago
50.	Founding Engineer (Lance (YC W26)) San Francisco, California, United States \| $160,000 – $300,000/yr \| on-site \| full-time \| entry \| python, javascript, software development \| 4w ago

view all 72 results

Frequently asked questions

What does a software engineer in san francisco earn?: SF compensation runs at the top end of the band. Founding engineer offers commonly clear $200k base + 0.5–2% equity at seed-to-Series-A. The typical band for a software engineer runs $120k–$200k base, equity at startups.
Are software engineer jobs in san francisco remote-friendly?: 6 of the current 72 listings (8%) allow remote work; the rest are on-site or hybrid in San Francisco.
What companies hire software engineer jobs in san francisco?: Jobs Base aggregates listings across YC-backed startups, growth-stage companies, and selected larger companies hiring with builder-role characteristics.
What's the difference between a software engineer and a regular software engineer?: Jobs Base only lists builder roles. Positions where one person owns the product end-to-end. We filter out ticket-driven, narrowly-scoped roles even when the title matches. About 9% of listings scraped match this definition.