Front End Engineer

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About Tailscale

Tailscale is making safe connection effortless by delivering software that makes it easy to securely interconnect people and their devices, no matter where they are. From hobbyists to multinational corporations, teams of every size use Tailscale each day to protect their networks, share access to internal tools, and more. We're building a future for the Internet that's easy, sensible, and safe, like it used to be. Founded in 2019 and fully distributed, we're backed by Accel, CRV, Insight, Heavybit, and Uncork Capital.

About the Role

We’re seeking a skilled and diligent full-time Frontend Engineer to join our growing team. You will work as part of our team to:

• Own the technical direction and architecture of Tailscale’s next-generation web console

• Build frontend infrastructure and platform capabilities that enable multiple Tailscale products to ship within a unified console experience

• Bring a special focus to identity-adjacent frontend systems, including authentication, session management, secure cross-origin integrations, and product surfaces that span multiple services

Because we’re a fully remote company building a highly technical product, we’re looking for someone who can move fluidly between product engineering and platform engineering. This role sits at an important intersection of user experience, browser security, developer tooling, and internal platform design. The ability to think strategically, make pragmatic architecture decisions, collaborate across engineering, design, growth, and infrastructure, and help other teams build with confidence is essential.

Key Responsibilities

• Define and drive the frontend architecture for Tailscale’s next-generation console, including application structure, routing, state boundaries, shared abstractions, and long-term maintainability

• Design and maintain cross-origin authentication and session infrastructure between the console and other services, including auth flows, CORS policies, CSRF protections, cookie/session strategies, and support for multiple deployment environments

• Build and operate a frontend serving platform capable of hosting multiple Tailscale products under a unified development workflow

• Establish shared infrastructure, conventions, and design patterns that consolidate distinct product experiences into a cohesive console platform

• Create frontend architecture patterns, tooling, and abstractions that enable non-frontend engineers to build accessible, production-quality UI safely and efficiently

• Partner closely with Product Design to turn complex infrastructure and identity concepts into intuitive user experiences

• Collaborate with Growth, Design, Product, and other engineering teams on experimentation and iteration, including A/B testing, analytics instrumentation, and feature rollout strategies

• Define and improve frontend testing strategy across the console, including integration testing, end-to-end coverage, local developer ergonomics, and abstractions that reduce testing complexity for product teams

• Work with infrastructure and engineering tooling teams to improve local development workflows, build pipelines, preview deployments, release ergonomics, and operational reliability

• Raise the quality bar for frontend engineering across Tailscale through technical leadership, reviews, mentoring, and clear platform guardrails

• Required participation in our on-call rotation every x weeks, to triage and mitigate incidents

What We Are Looking For

• Deep experience building and operating production React applications at scale

• Strong understanding of web platform fundamentals, including HTTP semantics, browser security boundaries, authentication flows, cookies, storage, CORS, and CSRF

• Experience building internal platforms, frameworks, or shared libraries that enable other teams to ship products with strong guardrails

• Experience driving a unified console or platform vision across disparate frontend codebases

• Strong judgment around frontend architecture: knowing when to standardize, when to abstract, and how to keep systems understandable as they grow

• Experience designing scalable frontend testing strategies that improve confidence while hiding incidental complexity from product engineers

• Comfort collaborating across disciplines and functions, especially with design, growth, infrastructure, and developer tooling

• Strong written and verbal communication, including the ability to explain tradeoffs and influence technical direction across teams

• A high degree of ownership and autonomy, with the ability to identify important problems and drive them through ambiguity

Nice to Have

• Experience designing frontend codebases and tooling optimized for AI-assisted development, including conventions and abstractions that help LLM-based agents produce correct, consistent UI with fewer iterations

• Experience with design systems, component libraries, and connecting design tooling to production UI workflows

• Experience with feature flagging, analytics, experimentation systems, and progressive delivery patterns

• Experience working on identity, admin, B2B SaaS, or security-sensitive product surfaces

As a company, we strive to maintain fair and equitable compensation practices within our team across all roles and all levels. Tailscale's compensation package includes base salary, equity, and comprehensive benefits. The salary range displayed on each job posting represents the target range for a new hire's base salary. Individual offers may vary based on experience and skill set.

CAN Pay Range

$218,420 - $273,360CAD

What We Offer

• An inclusive, flexible environment where you can be your authentic self. We recognize the impact of diverse voices and backgrounds on the growth of our people, product, and company. And that flexibility in how and when you work empowers our team to integrate work and life.

• A competitive total compensation package. This includes a base salary, an equity incentive plan and variable commission (for quota-based roles).

• Comprehensive group benefits with no waiting period. Take advantage of coverage for health, vision, dental, and more for you and your family!

• Remote first company—most of our teams work fully remotely. Enjoy a change of scenery wherever you can get wifi, participate in virtual and in-person social events, and leverage our corporate co-working program to visit WeWork (or other similar spaces near you). Some roles require in-office collaboration depending on team needs, which will be clearly noted in the job description.

• Employer-funded retirement contributions. Tailscale will match your retirement contributions dollar-for-dollar, up to a maximum annual employer contribution equal to 0.75% of your eligible compensation.

• Connect with other Tailscalars IRL. Attend our annual company retreat, participate in team off-sites, and collaborate in person with teammates across Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Singapore. We support intentional in-person connection through team travel and distributed collaboration.

• Support for your personal and professional development. Grow your career thoughtfully with $1500 USD annually for professional development, or take advantage of mentorship, coaching, and internal promotion opportunities.

• Paid time off and a healthy work-life integration. Our flexible, paid time off program supports you for any situation life throws your way, whether moving homes or travelling the world!

• A build-your-own home office setup. You choose your own company-owned laptop (Mac or PC), receive a monthly home internet reimbursement, and $500 USD to customize your workstation to make it your own.

• Paid parental leave program. We care about your life outside of work and encourage new parents to take advantage of parental leave top-ups (20 weeks for birthing parents, 16 weeks for non-birthing parents).

Tailscale is committed to providing an accessible and inclusive hiring process. If you require an accommodation at any stage of the recruitment process or related to any aspect of this role, please contact your recruiter.

Our hiring process uses AI-assisted tools to help screen and assess candidates. All hiring decisions are made by people.