Six Figure Work

Senior Software Architect, AI Systems and Networking

NVIDIA

Company websitenvidia.com (NVIDIA, opens in new tab)

Base salary $224,000  to $431,250

Employer-published annual base salary, USD. Advertised base range in Santa Clara, CA +2 more

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  • LocationSanta Clara, CA +2 more
  • WorkplaceWorkplace not stated
  • Status at last checkSource accepting applications when checked
  • Last checked (1 h ago) · observed since
All places named
  • Santa Clara, CA
  • Austin, TX
  • California

About this job

An applied research team within NVIDIA’s Networking Systems & Software Architecture group is solving some of AI’s hardest infrastructure problems. The team builds systems-level software that moves data between GPUs, nodes, and storage at the speed modern AI demands—spanning low-level transport optimization, hardware-software co-design, and communication frameworks that plug directly into production AI stacks. The team's charter expands into emerging domains including quantum computing interconnects.

The Senior Architect role is to own modules and projects end-to-end—from scoping research questions to shipping production code. It calls for a recognized expert who drives technical decisions, pulls in ideas from research and industry, and regularly prototypes new approaches to prove a point. The work lives at the boundary of applied research and production engineering!

What you will be doing:

  • Architecting and implementing high-performance communication and memory management libraries for distributed AI

  • Driving hardware-software co-optimization with GPU, DPU, NIC, and switch teams through GPUDirect RDMA, NVLink, and next-generation interconnects

  • Profiling and optimizing data movement across GPU memory, system DRAM, NVMe, and network fabrics

  • Integrating networking capabilities into AI serving stacks such as vLLM, SGLang, and TensorRT-LLM

  • Contributing to and maintaining open-source projects, mentoring engineers, conducting design reviews, and prototyping experimental technologies to evaluate their viability

What we need to see:

  • 12+ years in systems software and/or networking with demonstrated ownership of complex projects.

  • MS, PhD or equivalent experience in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or a related field.

  • Solid understanding of high-performance networking: InfiniBand, RoCE, RDMA, NVLink, GPUDirect.

  • Strong C/C++/Rust systems programming with comfort in performance profiling and low-level debugging.

  • Understanding of ML systems concepts—transformer architectures, KV cache mechanics, model parallelism, or distributed training and inference patterns.

Ways to stand out from the crowd:

  • Knowledge of ML inference frameworks (vLLM, SGLang, TensorRT-LLM) and their communication requirements.

  • Knowledge of storage networking (NVMe-oF, GPUDirect Storage, S3).

  • Background of Reinforcement Learning systems.

With competitive salaries and a comprehensive benefits package, NVIDIA is widely regarded as one of the most desirable technology employers in the world. Our teams are composed of some of the most forward‑thinking and driven engineers in the industry, and we continue to grow rapidly. If you are a senior data engineer passionate about building large‑scale, high‑impact data platforms, we’d love to hear from you.

Your base salary will be determined based on your location, experience, and other objective job-related factors. The expected base salary ranges for this position are:
224,000 USD – 356,500 USD for Level 5; and 272,000 USD – 431,250 USD for Level 6.

You will also be eligible for equity and benefits.

Applications for this job will be accepted at least until November 3, 2026.

This posting is for an existing vacancy. 

NVIDIA uses AI tools in its recruiting processes.

NVIDIA is committed to fostering an inclusive work environment and proud to be an equal opportunity employer. As we highly value diversity in our current and future employees, we do not discriminate (including in our hiring and promotion practices) on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, gender expression, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, disability status or any other characteristic protected by law.

Source: NVIDIA on Workday · View original posting (opens in new tab)

Pay in context

This role's base floor ($224,000) is above 82% of the 4,298 Software Engineering roles in California listed on this site; 74 others list the same floor. Their median floor is $176,000; the middle half runs from $149,100 to $202,000.

Only jobs on this site count, and each one publishes a base salary of $100,000 or more, so this compares six-figure jobs with each other, not with the whole market. Computed Nov 7, 2026.

This range next to 6 other live NVIDIA roles with the nearest advertised base floor
Chart as a table
This range next to 6 other live NVIDIA roles with the nearest advertised base floor
RolePublished base
Senior Software Architect, AI Systems and Networking (this listing)$224,000 - $431,250
Senior Full-Stack Lead Engineer$224,000 - $356,500
Senior Developer Relations Manager, Data Platforms$224,000 - $431,250
Senior Developer Relations Lead, AI-Enabled Drug Discovery Science$224,000 - $431,250
Manager, Solutions Architecture - AI Infrastructure Build Readiness$224,000 - $356,500
Senior Research Engineer - AI Coding Tools$224,000 - $431,250
Senior Retail Developer Relations Manager, Digital Commerce$224,000 - $431,250

Same $100K to $400K scale as every card. All NVIDIA roles · How to read the bar

Observed changes

  1. First observed on the employer's board
  2. Began meeting the published-salary criteria
Observed since
Employer-stated posting date
2026-10-30
Where this pay comes from

Location as the employer wrote it: US, CA, Santa Clara • US, TX, Austin • US, CA, Remote (Levels 5-6 combined)

224,000 USD – 356,500 USD for Level 5; and 272,000 USD – 431,250 USD for Level 6.

Method
Employer text, read with fixed rules and re-verified
Checked
Rule set
us-base-v2

The pay passage appears in the employer's own job text. Fixed, deterministic rules located it, and the passage below was checked against the stored copy of the posting.

What we verified

  • The pay figures come from the employer's own listing, quoted exactly above.
  • The pay is an annual base salary in US dollars with a minimum of at least $100,000.
  • The role was publicly listed on the employer's job board when last checked.

We do not verify what the employer will actually offer, whether the employer is still recruiting for the role, or anything beyond what the employer published. Full methodology.