Platform Engineer Job Description Template (Free, 2026)

Job Title: Platform Engineer [Mid-Level / Senior / Staff] Department: Engineering / Platform Location: [City, State] / Remote / Hybrid Reports To: Head of Platform / VP Engineering Employment Type: Full-Time About [Company Name] [Company Name] is a [stage/sector] company with a [X]-engineer product org that ships [product description]. Our platform team exists to multiply developer productivity — we treat developers as our customers and the internal developer platform as our product. We run on [AWS / GCP / Azure] with Kubernetes at the core. About the Role As a Platform Engineer, you will design, build, and operate the internal developer platform that powers [X] product engineering teams. Your work will reduce cognitive load, accelerate deployment velocity, and improve reliability across the organization. You will own golden paths, developer tooling, CI/CD infrastructure, and the Kubernetes platform — all with a product mindset focused on developer experience metrics. Key Responsibilities • Design and maintain the internal developer platform — self-service deployment, secret management, observability integration, and developer portals (e.g., Backstage) • Build and maintain CI/CD pipelines using [GitHub Actions / ArgoCD / Jenkins / Tekton] for [X]+ engineering teams • Manage and evolve Kubernetes clusters including workload scheduling, resource quotas, and platform upgrades • Define and implement infrastructure-as-code standards across the organization using Terraform or Pulumi • Build golden paths for common workload patterns: microservices, batch jobs, ML model serving, event-driven architectures • Create runbooks, platform documentation, and onboarding materials for internal engineering customers • Identify and reduce operational toil through automation; measure and report on developer productivity metrics • Collaborate with security teams to enforce policy-as-code (OPA/Kyverno), secret rotation, and compliance controls • Evaluate emerging platform tooling (Crossplane, CNOE, Dapr) and make evidence-based adoption recommendations • Participate in on-call rotations for platform-layer incidents; contribute to post-mortems Required Qualifications • [3]+ years in platform engineering, DevOps, or infrastructure engineering • Strong proficiency with Kubernetes in production (EKS, GKE, or AKS preferred) • Experience with infrastructure-as-code: Terraform, Pulumi, or CDK • Solid understanding of CI/CD pipeline design and GitOps practices (ArgoCD, Flux) • Proficiency in at least one scripting/automation language: Python, Go, or Bash • Experience with container registries, image scanning, and supply chain security (Sigstore, SLSA) • Familiarity with observability stack integration: Prometheus, Grafana, OpenTelemetry Nice to Have • Experience building Internal Developer Portals (Backstage, Port, Cortex) • Knowledge of platform engineering frameworks (Team Topologies, DORA metrics) • Crossplane or Cluster API experience • Service mesh experience (Istio, Linkerd) What We Offer • Competitive salary: $[low]–$[high]/year (see benchmarks below) • Equity: [X]% stock options / RSUs • Health, dental, and vision insurance (100% employer-paid for employee) • Flexible PTO + [X] company-wide holidays • Remote-friendly / home office stipend of $[X] • Learning & development budget: $[X]/year including conference attendance • [Additional perk — on-call compensation, wellness stipend, etc.] Salary Range: $115,000–$195,000/year (US, 2026 benchmark; exact offer commensurate with experience) [Company Name] is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees.