Principal Backend Engineer
Salary:£80,000 - £90,000
Location: UK or Europe
Please note:We are unable to sponsor international visas at this time.
About Nexus Mods
Established in 2001, Nexus Mods is the largest video game modding platform on the internet - a household name in the PC gaming ecosystem.
- 71M+ registered members
- 800K+ mods for 4,000+ games
- 21B+ mod downloads
- Massive scale serving millions of users and requests.
- Complex mod compatibility, dependencies, and versioning.
- A deeply engaged and passionate global modding community.
- Help millions of gamers discover, download, and manage mods effortlessly.
- Empower creators to publish and manage their work with confidence.
- Power high traffic APIs and distributed systems at scale.
- Support both web and desktop applications.
- Enable rapid experimentation and iteration on new features.
- Ensure the platform evolves to support the next decade of growth.
Role Requirements
Requirements:- Extensive backend engineering experience, ideally with gaming or tech.
- Deep experience with at least one backend language (Ruby, PHP, Java, Go, Node.js, etc.)
- Strong system design and architecture skills.
- Experience building and scaling APIs (REST and/or GraphQL).
- Solid understanding of distributed systems and event driven architectures.
- Experience with relational databases (Postgres/MySQL) and NoSQL (Redis/ElasticSeach).
- Experience with CI/CD, Docker, and Kubernetes.
- Strong communication skills and ability to lead through influence.
- Comfortable balancing speed, quality, and pragmatism.
- Experience with authentication, payments, or search systems.
- Background in high scale platforms or UGC.
- Understanding of gaming ecosystems (e.g. multiplayer services, content distribution, or digital marketplaces).
- Experience building tools for creators, modding communities, or user-generated content platforms.
- Passion for gaming, modding, or creator ecosystems.
Role Responsibilities
- Own technical direction within your pod (architecture, design, tooling, trade-offs).
- Build and scale backend services and APIs serving millions of users.
- Ensure systems are performant, reliable, and maintainable.
- Align pod decisions with wider platform architecture.
- Support and unblock engineers to help teammates work efficiently.
- Collaborate closely with Product, Design, and other disciplines.
- Drive engineering standards across code quality, testing, and delivery.
- Contribute to discovery, prototyping, and iterative delivery.
- Identify and tackle technical debt and scalability challenges.
Benefits of Working at Nexus Mods
Benefits:- We work a 4-day week of 32 hours, with no reduction in pay.
- An allowance of £25 each month to spend on video games.
- Employee Assistance Programme.
- Private BUPA healthcare for you and your family.
- A very flexible training budget.
- Regular social events throughout the year. Participation is optional!
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