Jobs / United States / Airbnb
Senior Software Engineer, Storage
Airbnb · 🇺🇸 United States
Sponsorship verdict
Sponsorship possible
One solid signal, not two — worth applying, and worth asking about sponsorship early.
- Employer is on a government sponsor recordThe US Department of Labor certified 167 H-1B/E-3 labor condition applications for this employer between Oct 2025 and Jun 2026 (latest Jun 2026) — the step every H-1B hire needs first. USCIS also records 71 H-1B approvals in FY2023. Source: LCA disclosure data (US Department of Labor (OFLC)).
- The posting doesn’t mention sponsorshipSilence isn’t a refusal — ask the recruiter before investing much time.
- No salary bar for this routeH-1B has no fixed salary bar: the employer must pay at least the prevailing wage for the role and area. Cap-subject employers enter a lottery weighted by wage level. Source: https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2025/12/29/2025-23853/weighted-selection-process-for-registrants-and-petitioners-seeking-to-file-cap-subject-h-1b, rules effective 2026-02-27.
- What Airbnb paid sponsored hires in similar roles82 certified filings for “Software Engineer” (Software Developers) in CA: $191k–$204k, median $196k. Most were filed at wage level III (45%) — 3 lottery entries, ≈46% projected selection odds for cap-subject employers. Source: US Department of Labor LCA disclosure data (Oct 2025 – Jun 2026).
- Confirmed live todayWhen a source last listed this job as open.
US H-1B: cap-subject employers enter a lottery weighted by wage level — Level I gets 1 entry, Level IV gets 4 (DHS projected selection odds ≈15% at Level I to ≈61% at Level IV). Universities and non-profit research employers are cap-exempt. The $100,000 fee for new petitions from abroad is currently blocked by a court order (appeal pending).
A verdict summarises public evidence; it is not legal advice and never a guarantee — the employer and the immigration authority decide. Sign in to factor in where you can already work.
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Sponsor Radar — Airbnb
The US Department of Labor certified 167 H-1B/E-3 labor condition applications for this employer between Oct 2025 and Jun 2026 (latest Jun 2026) — the step every H-1B hire needs first. USCIS also records 71 H-1B approvals in FY2023. Source: LCA disclosure data (US Department of Labor (OFLC)).
Past sponsorship or register membership never guarantees sponsorship for this vacancy or for you. Full Sponsor Radar for Airbnb →
About the role
Airbnb was born in 2007 when two hosts welcomed three guests to their San Francisco home, and has since grown to over 5 million hosts who have welcomed over 2 billion guest arrivals in almost every country across the globe. Every day, hosts offer unique stays and experiences that make it possible for guests to connect with communities in a more authentic way. The Community You Will Join The Online Data organization helps Airbnb's builders create real-time data experiences through intuitive data interfaces and tools, with no database expertise required. Within Online Data, the Transactional Storage Services team owns the core storage infrastructure behind Airbnb's online data systems. We design, build, and operate a new source-of-truth, horizontally scalable, open-source NewSQL database running on stateful Kubernetes. It holds Airbnb's critical user, listing, and financial data. You'll join the Database Kernel team, which owns performance, reliability, and stability for Airbnb's NewSQL engine at scale. The team's work centers on the storage layer and query execution engine, and also covers consensus and shard management. In this role you'll dig into database internals to diagnose and fix SQL latency and availability issues. You'll also work closely with our open-source database vendor on root cause analysis and upstream contributions. Examples of the Difference You'll Make • Dig into the query and storage layers to explain latency differences between B-tree and LSM-based storage engines. • Analyze query plans and execution paths (planning, optimization, operators, and distributed execution) to find and fix sources of SQL latency. • Tune storage engine behavior (compaction, caching, and I/O) for Airbnb's workloads. • Design and implement traffic prioritization at the storage layer for connection pooling. • Drive root cause analysis on high-severity incidents with our open-source vendor, and land fixes upstream. Your Expertise • 5+ years of software engineering, including significant hands-on work on a database storage layer or query execution engine. • Strong SQL skills, plus an understanding of how queries are planned, optimized, and executed at the engine level. • Deep understanding of storage engine internals (e.g., B-tree/LSM, compaction, indexing, I/O) and/or query processing (e.g., planning, optimization, execution operators). • Experience with distributed databases (replication, consensus, transactions) is a strong plus, and familiarity with NewSQL systems like TiDB is a bonus. • Ability to own and dive deeply into a complex database codebase, ideally an open-source one. Upstream contributions are a plus. • Experience analyzing and debugging high-severity production incidents, especially performance and latency problems. • Writes clean, testable, maintainable code. • Strong collaboration and communication skills in a remote working environment. • Strong ownership and a consistent track record of delivery. Our Commitment To Inclusion & Belonging: Airbnb is committed to working with the broadest talent pool possible. We believe diverse ideas foster innovation and engagement, and allow us to attract creatively-led people, and to develop the best products, services and solutions. All qualified individuals are encouraged to apply. We strive to also provide a disability inclusive application and interview process. If you are a candidate with a disability and require reasonable accommodation in order to submit an application, please contact us at: reasonableaccommodations@airbnb.com . Please include your full name, the role you’re applying for and the accommodation necessary to assist you with the recruiting process. We ask that you only reach out to us if you are a candidate whose disability prevents you fro