Senior UX Engineer, Prototyping Platforms

📍 Job Overview

Job Title: Senior UX Engineer, Prototyping Platforms

Company: Reddit

Location: Remote - United States

Job Type: Full-Time

Category: UX Engineering / Design Technology

Date Posted: December 05, 2025

Experience Level: 5-10 years

Remote Status: Fully Remote

🚀 Role Summary

• Lead the strategic evolution of Reddit's prototyping capabilities, transitioning from ad-hoc prototypes to a scalable, robust platform for experimentation.

• Architect and develop a sophisticated web-based prototyping environment using modern technologies like React and Next.js, enabling dynamic A/B testing and feature validation.

• Drive operational efficiency by automating repetitive design and testing workflows, empowering researchers and designers to gather insights rapidly and with minimal overhead.

• Serve as a critical liaison between Design and Engineering, ensuring high-fidelity, authentic user experiences are tested before production, focusing on relevance and user impact.

📝 Enhancement Note: This role is positioned within the "Prototyping Platforms" team, indicating a strong focus on building internal tools and infrastructure rather than direct product feature development. The emphasis on "operationalizing innovation" and creating a "strategic, data-generating force" suggests a highly impactful position that bridges the gap between design vision and engineering reality, with a significant influence on how new features are validated. The "invention factory" analogy points towards a culture of rapid iteration and building reusable systems.

📈 Primary Responsibilities

• Shape Technical Vision: Define and own the technical architecture for Reddit's entire prototyping ecosystem, guiding the transition from static designs to dynamic, data-driven experiments.

• Platform Development: Architect, build, and maintain a scalable, web-based prototyping environment, leveraging React, Next.js, Node, Firebase, and Cursor, to support dynamic swapping of screens and user journeys for A/B testing.

• Accelerate Experimentation Velocity: Partner closely with User Experience Researchers (UXR) to significantly reduce the time-to-insight for complex product questions by automating testing processes and enabling quantitative tests with hundreds of users.

• Bridge Design and Engineering: Act as the primary technical translator between design concepts and production engineering teams, managing real data flows to ensure tested experiences are authentic and relevant.

• Internal Tooling Leadership: Identify and address repetitive workflows within the design organization by building internal tools or reusable component libraries to enhance efficiency and prevent redundant efforts.

• Mentorship and Best Practices: Foster a culture of technical excellence and curiosity within the design team by establishing and promoting best practices for prototype engineering, code quality, and performance optimization.

📝 Enhancement Note: The responsibilities highlight a blend of strategic technical leadership and hands-on development. The emphasis on "automating the 'grunt work' of testing" and building tools that "automate it if we are building it twice" underscores a strong focus on efficiency and scalability, aligning with core Revenue Operations and Sales Operations principles of optimizing processes for speed and accuracy.

🎓 Skills & Qualifications

Education: While no specific degree is listed, a strong educational foundation in Computer Science, Human-Computer Interaction, or a related technical field is implied by the technical requirements and experience level.

Experience: 5+ years of progressive experience in UX Engineering, Design Technology, Frontend Development, or a closely related discipline, with a demonstrated history of building systems, platforms, or complex internal tools.

Required Skills:

• Technical Mastery: Deep expertise in the modern web stack including React, Next.js, Node.js, Firebase, and potentially Cursor. Proficiency in setting up infrastructure and architecture is crucial.

• Systems Thinking: Proven ability to build scalable frameworks, component libraries, or testing environments, indicated by a strong portfolio or track record.

• Strategic Leadership: Demonstrated capacity to identify inefficiencies ("time sinks") in design processes and independently propose and implement technical solutions.

• Bias for Action & Ambiguity Tolerance: Ability to self-unblock, thrive in ambiguous environments, and make sound judgments on when to prioritize speed for concept validation versus engineering for platform stability.

• Design Fluency: Strong understanding of interaction design, accessibility standards, and the importance of prototype fidelity in user research and validation.

• Impactful Shipping: A history of successfully delivering internal tools or platforms that have demonstrably improved team efficiency or product outcomes.

Preferred Skills:

• Experience with A/B testing frameworks and methodologies.

• Familiarity with user research methodologies and data analysis.

• Experience in building and maintaining component libraries or design systems.

• Knowledge of CI/CD pipelines for internal tools.

• Experience working in a fast-paced, high-growth tech environment.

📝 Enhancement Note: The requirements emphasize full-stack capabilities and systems thinking beyond just UI polishing. The "Bias for Action" and "thriving in ambiguity" are key soft skills for operations roles, indicating the need for adaptability and proactive problem-solving in a dynamic environment. The mention of "Cursor" is specific and suggests an emerging tool or workflow the team might be exploring.

📊 Process & Systems Portfolio Requirements

Portfolio Essentials:

• System Architecture Examples: Showcase projects where you designed and implemented scalable frameworks, component libraries, or complex internal tools, demonstrating your systems thinking.

• Prototyping Platform Components: Include examples of interactive prototypes or components that were part of a larger, reusable system, highlighting flexibility and dynamic capabilities.

• Workflow Automation Case Studies: Present projects where you identified and automated repetitive design or testing workflows, quantifying the efficiency gains (e.g., time saved, reduced errors).

• Data Integration & Experimentation: If possible, detail projects that involved integrating real data or setting up environments for A/B testing or user validation, demonstrating your ability to bridge design with measurable outcomes.

Process Documentation:

• Workflow Design: Ability to map out and document existing design and testing workflows to identify bottlenecks and areas for improvement.

• Platform Implementation: Document the architecture, setup, and usage guidelines for the prototyping platform and any associated tools or component libraries.

• Performance Analysis: Demonstrate how you measure the impact and efficiency of the tools and platforms you build, using metrics relevant to team productivity and research velocity.

📝 Enhancement Note: For a role focused on building platforms and internal tools, the portfolio is critical. It needs to go beyond showcasing individual UI elements or simple prototypes. Candidates should highlight their ability to think in terms of systems, reusability, and automation, demonstrating a clear understanding of how their work contributes to broader organizational efficiency and data-driven decision-making.

💵 Compensation & Benefits

Salary Range: $180,200 - $252,300 USD per year.

Benefits:

• Equity: Eligible for Restricted Stock Units (RSUs).

• Health & Wellness: Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision insurance.

• Retirement: 401(k) program with employer match.

• Time Off: Generous paid time off for vacation.

• Family Support: Parental leave.

• Additional: Potential for commission, depending on the specific role and performance.

Working Hours: While not explicitly stated, a standard full-time work week of approximately 40 hours is implied. The role's remote nature offers flexibility, but core collaboration hours will likely be expected.

📝 Enhancement Note: The provided salary range is for US-based employees. Reddit benchmarks its compensation against similar-stage growth companies. The inclusion of equity (RSUs) and potential commission indicates a performance-driven compensation structure, common in roles that directly impact business outcomes. The benefits package is robust, covering health, financial, and work-life balance aspects, which are attractive to experienced professionals.

🎯 Team & Company Context

🏢 Company Culture

Industry: Social Media / Internet Services

Company Size: Reddit is a large, publicly traded company with a significant global presence. Its continued growth implies an evolving, dynamic work environment.

Founded: Reddit was founded in 2005, giving it a mature but still innovative operational history.

Team Structure:

• The "Proto Team" is a specialized unit focused on building the infrastructure that powers experimentation and innovation within the design and product organizations.

• As a Senior UX Engineer, you will likely report into a Design Technology or Engineering leadership within a broader Product or Design umbrella.

Methodology:

• Data-Driven Experimentation: The core function of the Proto Team is to operationalize data generation through experimentation.

• Systems Thinking & Reusability: Emphasis on building modular, reusable systems and tools to maximize efficiency and scalability.

• Agile & Iterative Development: The "invention factory" concept suggests an iterative approach to building and refining tools and platforms.

Company Website: https://www.redditinc.com/

📝 Enhancement Note: Reddit's culture is rooted in its diverse communities and authentic conversations. This often translates into a workplace that values open communication, user focus, and a willingness to experiment. For operations roles, this means a likely emphasis on data integrity, process transparency, and cross-functional collaboration. The "invention factory" metaphor suggests a forward-thinking, problem-solving culture.

📈 Career & Growth Analysis

Operations Career Level: This is a Senior-level individual contributor role. It demands significant technical expertise, strategic thinking, and the ability to lead technical initiatives autonomously. It sits at the intersection of engineering and design, requiring a unique skill set focused on enabling others.

Reporting Structure: Typically, a Senior UX Engineer would report to a Manager or Director of Design Technology, Engineering, or Product. This role likely involves influencing peers and junior team members rather than direct people management, though mentorship is a key component.

Operations Impact: This role has a direct impact on the speed and quality of product innovation at Reddit. By operationalizing experimentation and improving the efficiency of the design and research process, it accelerates time-to-insight, validates user needs more effectively, and ultimately influences the success of new features and products before they reach mass production.

Growth Opportunities:

• Technical Specialization: Deepen expertise in building scalable web platforms, prototyping systems, and advanced experimentation infrastructure.

• Technical Leadership: Grow into a Principal or Staff Engineer role, leading larger architectural initiatives or taking on broader platform ownership.

• Cross-Functional Influence: Expand influence across product, design, and engineering teams, shaping the strategic direction of innovation processes.

• Mentorship & Team Building: Develop leadership skills through mentoring junior engineers and contributing to the growth of the Proto Team's capabilities.

📝 Enhancement Note: This role offers a unique growth path for engineers who want to influence product development indirectly but powerfully. It's ideal for those who enjoy building tools and systems that empower others, a common trajectory for senior operations professionals who thrive on optimizing workflows and enabling sales or marketing teams.

🌐 Work Environment

Office Type: Reddit offers a flexible work environment. While physical offices exist, the role is "completely remote-friendly," allowing employees to work from home as much as they like, or utilize office spaces if located nearby.

Office Location(s): While the role is remote, Reddit maintains physical office locations. The specific locations are not listed but are generally in major tech hubs. The remote nature means candidates can be based anywhere in the United States.

Workspace Context:

• Remote Collaboration: Expect a highly collaborative remote environment utilizing tools like Slack, video conferencing, and project management software.

• Tooling & Technology: Access to a modern technology stack and development tools is expected, supporting efficient development and experimentation.

• Cross-Functional Interaction: Opportunities to interact with diverse teams across Product, Design, Engineering, and Research are integral to the role.

Work Schedule: Standard full-time hours are expected, with flexibility inherent in a remote setup. The focus will be on meeting project milestones and collaborating effectively during core business hours.

📝 Enhancement Note: The fully remote nature of this position in the United States is a significant advantage for work-life balance and geographic flexibility. The company culture likely supports asynchronous communication and asynchronous work patterns where possible, while still emphasizing synchronous collaboration for critical discussions and team alignment.

📄 Application & Portfolio Review Process

Interview Process:

• Initial Screen: A recruiter or hiring manager will likely conduct an initial screening to assess basic qualifications, experience, and cultural fit.

Be prepared to discuss your high-level experience with prototyping platforms and systems thinking.

• Technical Interviews: Expect multiple rounds focusing on technical skills. This will likely include:

  • System Design: Discussing how you would architect a scalable prototyping platform, considering modularity, data flow, and A/B testing capabilities.
  • Coding Challenges: Hands-on coding exercises, potentially live or take-home, focusing on React, Next.js, and frontend architecture.
  • Problem-Solving: Scenarios related to identifying and solving technical challenges in design processes or tool development.

• Portfolio Review: A dedicated session to walk through your portfolio, discussing specific projects, your role, the technical challenges, and the impact you achieved.

• Behavioral/Cultural Fit: Interviews assessing your collaboration style, leadership potential, ability to thrive in ambiguity, and alignment with Reddit's values.

Portfolio Review Tips:

• Focus on Systems, Not Just UI: Highlight projects where you built reusable components, frameworks, or entire platforms, not just individual screens or one-off websites.

• Quantify Impact: For each project, clearly articulate the problem you solved, your specific contributions, the technical approach, and the measurable outcomes (e.g., time saved, efficiency gained, increased testing velocity).

• Demonstrate Technical Depth: Be ready to discuss your architectural decisions, technology choices, and the trade-offs you made.

• Tell a Story: Structure your portfolio walkthrough to tell a compelling story about your growth, problem-solving skills, and impact.

Challenge Preparation:

• System Design Practice: Prepare to whiteboard or discuss architectural approaches for complex systems, focusing on scalability, maintainability, and extensibility.

• React/Next.js Proficiency: Brush up on modern React patterns, state management, Next.js features (like SSR, SSG), and performance optimization techniques.

• Operational Thinking: Frame your solutions not just technically, but also in terms of how they improve team efficiency, reduce operational overhead, and enable faster, data-driven decisions.

📝 Enhancement Note: The interview process for a senior technical role at a company like Reddit is rigorous. Highlighting a portfolio that demonstrates systems thinking, quantifiable impact, and technical leadership is paramount. Candidates should be prepared to discuss not just "what" they built, but "why" and "how" it improved processes and outcomes.

🛠 Tools & Technology Stack

Primary Tools:

• Frontend Frameworks: React, Next.js (core for building the web-based prototyping environment).

• Backend/Infrastructure: Node.js, Firebase (for backend services, data storage, and potentially real-time features).

• Development Environment: Cursor (mentioned specifically, suggesting a focus on AI-assisted coding or advanced IDE features).

• Version Control: Git (standard for all software development).

Analytics & Reporting:

• Experimentation Platforms: Tools to facilitate A/B testing and quantitative user research.

• Data Visualization: Internal or external tools to analyze and present experiment results.

CRM & Automation:

• While not directly a CRM role, understanding how prototypes feed into product development pipelines is key. Automation will be a significant theme, likely involving CI/CD for internal tools and workflow automation scripts.

• Integration Tools: Potentially tools for integrating the prototyping platform with other internal systems.

📝 Enhancement Note: Proficiency in React and Next.js is non-negotiable. Experience with Firebase suggests a need for understanding cloud-based backend services. The mention of "Cursor" is unique and warrants investigation into its specific use case within Reddit's development workflow, possibly related to AI-powered coding assistance or advanced debugging.

👥 Team Culture & Values

Operations Values:

• User-Centricity: A fundamental value at Reddit, meaning decisions are driven by understanding and serving the user community. For this role, it translates to building tools that genuinely help designers and researchers understand users better.

• Authenticity & Openness: Reddit's platform thrives on authentic conversations. This likely extends to the workplace, valuing transparency and direct communication.

• Data-Driven Decision Making: The emphasis on experimentation and "data-generating force" highlights a strong reliance on metrics and evidence to guide product development.

• Efficiency & Speed: The drive to "accelerate velocity" and automate "grunt work" underscores a commitment to optimizing processes and enabling rapid iteration.

Collaboration Style:

• Cross-Functional Partnership: Close collaboration with UXR, Product Designers, and Production Engineers is essential. You'll be translating between these disciplines.

• Proactive Communication: In a remote, fast-paced environment, proactive communication and documentation are key to keeping everyone aligned.

• Mentorship & Knowledge Sharing: A culture that encourages sharing best practices and mentoring others to elevate the team's overall technical capability.

📝 Enhancement Note: The company values, particularly "authenticity" and "data-driven decision making," are highly relevant to operations roles. Candidates should be prepared to demonstrate how they embody these values through their work, emphasizing transparency in their processes and using data to justify their technical decisions and platform improvements.

⚡ Challenges & Growth Opportunities

Challenges:

• Bridging High-Fidelity Design with Live Data: Ensuring prototypes accurately reflect potential real-world user interactions and data flows, which can be complex.

• Scalability of Experimentation: Building a platform that can reliably support scaled A/B testing for a large user base and diverse product teams.

• Balancing Speed and Stability: Knowing when to rapidly prototype for validation versus when to engineer robust, stable infrastructure.

• Evolving Tooling Landscape: Keeping pace with advancements in web technologies, prototyping tools, and experimentation methodologies.

Learning & Development Opportunities:

• Advanced Platform Engineering: Gaining deep expertise in building and scaling complex web applications and internal platforms.

• Experimentation Strategy: Learning how to design and implement effective A/B testing strategies that yield actionable insights.

• Cross-Disciplinary Expertise: Expanding knowledge in UX design principles, user research methodologies, and production engineering practices.

• Technical Leadership: Developing skills in architectural design, technical strategy, and team mentorship within a leading tech company.

📝 Enhancement Note: The challenges presented are typical for senior roles focused on platform development and operational efficiency. They offer significant opportunities for professional growth, particularly in areas like system architecture, data integration, and strategic technical leadership within a product development lifecycle.

💡 Interview Preparation

Strategy Questions:

• "Describe your approach to architecting a scalable, reusable prototyping platform. What are the key components and considerations?" (Focus on modularity, data flow, extensibility, and A/B testing integration).

• "How would you measure the success and impact of the prototyping platform you build? What metrics would you track?" (Think efficiency gains, time-to-insight reduction, number of experiments run, qualitative feedback).

Company & Culture Questions:

• "What interests you about Reddit and specifically the Proto Team's mission?" (Research Reddit's communities, values, and the "invention factory" concept. Connect your passion for building enabling tools to their goals).

• "How do you approach collaboration with designers and researchers who may have different technical backgrounds?" (Emphasize communication, empathy, and translating technical concepts clearly).

Portfolio Presentation Strategy:

• Structure: Start with a high-level overview of the project's goal, followed by your specific role and contributions. Detail the technical challenges and your solutions. Conclude with measurable impact and lessons learned.

• Visuals: Use clear diagrams for architecture, screenshots of tools/prototypes, and charts for impact metrics.

• Narrative: Tell a compelling story that showcases your problem-solving skills, technical expertise, and ability to drive efficiency and innovation.

• Audience Awareness: Tailor your explanations to the interviewers' likely backgrounds (e.g., explain technical concepts clearly to non-engineers).

📝 Enhancement Note: For this role, interviewers will be looking for a blend of deep technical ability, strategic foresight, and a strong understanding of how to enable product development through robust internal platforms. Be prepared to discuss both the "what" and the "why" of your past projects.

📌 Application Steps

To apply for this Senior UX Engineer position:

• Submit your application through the provided Greenhouse link.

• Portfolio Customization: Curate your portfolio to prominently feature projects demonstrating systems thinking, scalable framework development, and workflow automation. Prioritize case studies with quantifiable impact on efficiency or product validation.

• Resume Optimization: Ensure your resume clearly highlights your experience with React, Next.js, Node.js, and systems-level development. Use keywords such as "UX Engineering," "Design Technology," "Platform Development," "Prototyping," "A/B Testing," and "Internal Tools." Quantify achievements where possible.

• Mock Interview Practice: Practice articulating your technical solutions and project impacts, especially for system design and behavioral questions. Prepare to walk through your portfolio confidently, focusing on your contributions and the outcomes achieved.

• Company Research: Familiarize yourself with Reddit's products, user communities, and company values. Understand the "Proto Team's" mission and how it aligns with Reddit's broader goals of fostering innovation and user engagement.

⚠️ Important Notice: This enhanced job description includes AI-generated insights and operations industry-standard assumptions. All details should be verified directly with the hiring organization before making application decisions.

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