Principal Software Development Engineer, Rich Media

About the teamThe Rich Media AI group aims to reinvent the real estate buying and renting experience, where every mover can get an immersive and deep sense of a home online and reimagine it as their own. We are inventing technologies that allow people to feel like they’re already there - all from their phone or desktop. Using cutting-edge computer vision and AI science, we work across disciplines to build products like 360 tours, floor plans, aerial overviews, and new experiences not even imagined yet! Combined, we are creating the next chapter of home shopping experiences. As a Principal Software Development Engineer within Rich Media’s Home Capture team (residing within Zillow’s AI organization), you'll be well-positioned as an engineer focused on building and improving how Zillow Group captures and ingests Rich Media into our backend systems.

About the role

As a Principal Software Development Engineer, you will play a pivotal role within Rich Media’s mission that enables large forward-looking work that unlocks wins across multiple teams. Home Capture team is the first stop along the pathway to better and more innovative experiences, providing real estate photographers and related systems the infrastructure and solutions they need to best capture the data required to connect and build these experiences. 

In this role, you will oversee larger-scoped projects that span across teams and partner orgs. Your most significant impact will stem from your ability to foresee future problems and orchestrate solutions, strategize across teams, and lead technical projects that span multiple teams/orgs in addition to your coding contributions.

You Will Get To:

• Foresee technical problems that the teams are not yet facing and propose corrective actions

• Innovate new solutions that balance implementation time, quality, observability, scalability, and maintainability.

• Strategize future solutions that enable Rich Media solutions to efficiently scale

• Lead technical service solutions spanning multiple teams

• Mentor engineers within and outside the team

• Oversee key performance indicators and ensure proper visibility

This role has been categorized as a Remote position. “Remote” employees do not have a permanent corporate office workplace and, instead, work from a physical location of their choice, which must be identified to the Company. U.S. employees may live in any of the 50 United States, with limited exceptions.

In California, Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Washington state, and Washington DC the standard base pay range for this role is $191,300.00 - $305,700.00 annually. This base pay range is specific to these locations and may not be applicable to other locations. In Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois, Minnesota, Nevada, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Vermont the standard base pay range for this role is $181,800.00 - $290,400.00 annually. The base pay range is specific to these locations and may not be applicable to other locations.

In addition to a competitive base salary this position is also eligible for equity awards based on factors such as experience, performance and location. Actual amounts will vary depending on experience, performance and location. Employees in this role will not be paid below the salary threshold for exempt employees in the state where they reside.

Who you are

• 7+ years of backend engineering experience

• Proactively collaborates across teams to communicate strategy and decisions

• Communication at technical, product strategy, and leadership levels

• Experience in creating technical software architecture designs

• Experience balancing delivering quality code with delivering experiences on a deadline

• Mentors senior engineers to develop independent technical leadership

• Defines and evolves platform-wide architectural standards, paved-road libraries, and testing/monitoring practices to ensure scalability and maintainability.

• Always seeking opportunities to identify and improve inefficiencies in existing systems 

• Experience with cloud services (AWS Preferred)

• Champion quality and stability of services

• Knowledgeable of the software development lifecycle including code reviews testing, and operations

• Excels at driving large features from design to implementation

Optional but preferred: 

• Experience working closely with other platform engineers in mobile, web, ML, CV.

• Experience with photography, imaging, computer graphics

• Experience in Go (formerly Golang)

• Experience with AWS

• Experience with Kafka or other data streaming pipelines

Get to know us

At Zillow, we’re reimagining how people move—through the real estate market and through their careers. As the most-visited real estate platform in the U.S., we help customers navigate buying, selling, financing and renting with greater ease and confidence. Whether you're working in tech, sales, operations, or design, you’ll be part of a company that's reshaping an industry and helping more people make home a reality.

Zillow is honored to be recognized among the best workplaces in the country. Zillow was named one of FORTUNE 100 Best Companies to Work For® in 2025, and included on the PEOPLE Companies That Care® 2025 list, reflecting our commitment to creating an innovative, inclusive, and engaging culture where employees are empowered to grow.

No matter where you sit in the organization, your work will help drive innovation, support our customers, and move the industry—and your career—forward, together.

Zillow Group is an equal opportunity employer committed to fostering an inclusive, innovative environment with the best employees. We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, gender identity or Veteran status. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation, please contact your recruiter directly.

Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with applicable state and local law.

Los Angeles County applicants: Job duties for this position include: work safely and cooperatively with other employees, supervisors, and staff; adhere to standards of excellence despite stressful conditions; communicate effectively and respectfully with employees, supervisors, and staff to ensure exceptional customer service; and follow all federal, state, and local laws and Company policies. Criminal history may have a direct, adverse, and negative relationship with some of the material job duties of this position. These include the duties and responsibilities listed above, as well as the abilities to adhere to company policies, exercise sound judgment, effectively manage stress and work safely and respectfully with others, exhibit trustworthiness and professionalism, and safeguard business operations and the Company’s reputation. Pursuant to the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.