Careers at DuckDuckGo
Join our fully distributed team and help raise the standard of trust online!
We host yearly meetups around the world so our global team can strengthen connections and work together face-to-face.
Join Our Global Team
DuckDuckGo is a remote company of 335+ passionate people from over 15 countries. Together, we're on a mission to show the world that protecting privacy can be simple.
We embrace diverse perspectives and seek hardworking, self-motivated individuals. Interested in joining our team? Learn about our unique culture and support resources we offer team members.
Take Back Your Schedule
No core hours means working when you're most productive, and taking time off when you need it.
Love Where You Work
Since 2012, we've maintained an average team retention of over 95%, even as we've tripled in size over the past few years.
Fair Pay For Everyone
Everyone at the same professional level earns the same pay regardless of factors like race, gender, age, and location.
The DuckDuckGo Hiring Process
Hiring works best when it's a two-way street. That's why we help you get to know us and envision what your future role at DuckDuckGo might look like. Learn more about how we hire.
We follow a flexible timeline based on your schedule and current employment status. For details on how we treat your personal data during this process, see our Recruiting Information Policy.
1
Chat With Us
If your application is a good match, our talent manager will invite you to a brief call.
2
Complete Projects
Next, we'll send you a paid test project. Expect a second if all goes well.
3
Meet Our Team
We'll talk between projects so we can learn more about each other.
4
Hop Onboard!
If everyone thinks it's a good fit, we'll make you an offer to join.
Open Positions
Data Science
Who We Are
Hi, we're DuckDuckGo, the online protection company and remote-first team of 300+ on a mission to raise the standard of trust online. Founded in 2008 and profitable since 2014, annual revenue now exceeds $100m USD and millions use our browser on Mac, Windows, iOS, and Android, our search engine, and the DuckDuckGo subscription. Our culture of trust, inclusivity, and empowered project management underpins everything we do, where each team member takes full ownership of their projects, from scoping and execution to postmortem. If you're seeking end-to-end ownership of your work, you've come to the right place!
Your Team and Role
Working on the Data Science Functional Team, you'll drive product and business impact through statistical modeling, experiment design, Bayesian marketing analysis, and classifier implementation across our search engine, instant answers, AI, and revenue optimization. Recent projects include:
Defining core growth metrics for our products and building the infrastructure to monitor trends and anomalies
Measuring the impact of major marketing campaigns for Duck.ai, translating full-funnel data into actionable decisions
Building monitoring pipelines to detect unexpected shifts in search traffic patterns faster and more reliably
Expanding evaluation datasets for page context understanding across complex scenarios like multi-tab browsing and content reattachment
Improving the trigger systems that determine when AI-assisted answers surface in DuckDuckGo Search, balancing quality and our privacy-first approach
Our data meets rigorous privacy standards and is necessarily sparse, so you'll need to think creatively to surface actionable insights in an evidence-first culture where quantitative rigor is the baseline, not the exception.
About You
You have 7+ years of experience in Data Science and a track record of leading high-complexity projects from scoping to production with minimal direction.
You can do 2 or more of the following:
Deploy and iterate on ML in production environments
Develop and deploy NLP solutions
Apply knowledge of LLMs including fine-tuning, LLM-as-judge, and AI-assisted development
Conduct marketing campaign analysis using Bayesian methods
You write production-grade code in Python or a comparable high-level language.
You have advanced SQL and query optimization skills, familiarity with columnar databases like BigQuery, Clickhouse, Redshift, or Druid; experience with a BI tool like Tableau or PowerBI is a plus.
You can design, implement, and analyze experiments across product surfaces, and are comfortable deriving insights from sparse or privacy-constrained data.
You collaborate effectively with product teams and contribute to overall team throughput.
Compensation
$178,500 USD annually and stock options. Compensation is identical within professional levels, regardless of geographic location or team. Compensation for each professional level is transparent across the organization.
Eligibility for company-sponsored health benefits is limited to team members based in the United States. This program does not extend to team members located in other countries, such as Canada or the UK.
Our Team Member Support Guide explains how we prioritize your wellbeing including paid parental leave, office setup, and co-working allowances.
Hiring Process
Hiring works best when it's a two-way street. Learn how we help you get to know DuckDuckGo, envision your future role here, and find out more about how we hire.
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
DuckDuckGo provides equal work opportunities to all team members and applicants, and it prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type on the basis of race, color, ethnicity, caste, religion, age, sex (including pregnancy), national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by our policies or federal, state, or local laws.
We want to ensure that our hiring process is accessible. If you need reasonable accommodation for any part of the application process because of a medical condition or disability, please send an email to careers@duckduckgo.com to let us know the nature of your request.
Please note that:
You’ll be required to attend meetings on camera via video conferencing
Expect to travel at least two times a year: once for our all-hands meetup and again for a team retreat (each around 4-5 days). While extenuating circumstances may impact attendance, everyone is strongly encouraged to attend.
While we offer a flexible work arrangement with no core hours, expect an average full-time commitment of 40 hours per week.
A successful candidate must pass a background check as a condition of joining the team.
By applying for this role, you confirm that all information submitted is accurate and complete. You further acknowledge that providing false or fraudulent information during the application process is cause for denial of an offer, revocation of any existing offer, or other adverse action, up to and including termination after the start of your commencement of work.
Disclosure Statement: Use of AI in Hiring Process
As part of our commitment to enhancing our recruitment process, we utilize artificial intelligence (AI) technology to assist in reviewing and summarizing job applications and test projects, including those tools integrated into our recruitment vendor platforms. We use AI to flag potentially fraudulent applications, analyze and summarize applicants’ experience, interviews, and project performance, and help streamline our selection process.
Key Principles:
Data Privacy: All information provided in your application will be handled in accordance with our Recruiting Privacy Policy. We ensure that your personal information is protected and used solely for recruitment purposes.
Human Oversight and Accountability: The AI technology is designed to support our hiring team by providing insights and summaries of applications and evaluations of test projects against scoring rubrics. All final evaluations and hiring decisions, however, will be made by our hiring team, who will consider the AI's input alongside other factors.
Transparency: We believe in transparency regarding our hiring practices. If you have any questions about how AI is used in our recruitment process, please feel free to reach out to us.
By submitting your application, you acknowledge and consent to the use of AI technology in our review process. If you would like to request an alternative selection process, please contact us as at careers@duckduckgo.com. Thank you for your interest in joining DuckDuckGo!
#LI-DNI
Who We Are
Your Team and Role
Working on the Data Science Functional Team, you'll drive product and business impact by developing data scientists, setting clear expectations for them, providing hands-on mentorship, and removing blockers.
You will guide and advise multiple data science projects so that they stay on track and have timely delivery with maximum impact. These projects will involve statistical modeling, experiment design, and classifier implementation across our search engine, instant answers, AI, and revenue optimization. You'll collaborate cross-functionally to validate direction through data, build trust in organizational tactics and strategy by consulting on experiments, and become an expert in our core metrics like searches, installs, and revenue. You'll also drive improvement of the data pipeline. Because of our strong privacy policies, you'll need to think creatively and develop strategies for how we can surface more actionable insights in an evidence-first culture where quantitative rigor is the baseline, not the exception.
As a Director, Data Science, you'll help shape our all-in-one privacy solution and join our mission to show the world that protecting your privacy online can be simple.
About You
You have 10+ years of experience in data science or ML engineering, with 4+ years leading teams, and a track record of setting multi-team roadmaps and adapting swiftly as priorities shift.
You've driven organizational culture toward data-driven decision-making and can translate technical tradeoffs and risks clearly for executives and cross-functional stakeholders.
You enjoy coaching experienced data scientists who are already highly skilled. You give direct, actionable feedback and you've built teams where people do the best work of their careers.
You can deploy and iterate ML and NLP solutions in production at expert level, with deep knowledge of when to reach for which tools - especially in constrained environments requiring fast responses and strict privacy standards.
You write production-grade code in Python or a comparable high-level language and stay close to the technical work when it matters most.
You have advanced SQL and query optimization skills, familiarity with columnar databases like BigQuery, Clickhouse, Redshift, or Druid.
You have strong LLM/AI experience including fine-tuning, LLM-as-judge evaluation, and AI-assisted development, and can design, implement, and analyze experiments across product surfaces using sparse or privacy-constrained data.
Preferred: experience at a consumer-facing tech company where data or analytics is core to the product strategy.
Compensation
$ 243,800 USD annually and stock options. Compensation is identical within professional levels, regardless of geographic location or team. Compensation for each professional level is transparent across the organization.
Hiring Process
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
Please note that:
You’ll be required to attend meetings on camera via video conferencing
While we offer a flexible work arrangement with no core hours, expect an average full-time commitment of 40 hours per week.
A successful candidate must pass a background check as a condition of joining the team.
Disclosure Statement: Use of AI in Hiring Process
Key Principles:
Engineering - Backend Engineering
Who We Are
Your Team and Role
Working on the Backend Functional Team, you'll lead complex projects across key company-wide objectives. Using Perl (Version 5), Go, and Node.js, you’ll write pragmatic, performant, testable code that works consistently, and work on related projects. Recent projects include:
Implementing AI-assisted answers and integrating them into our Search product while maintaining our privacy-first approach
Delivering improvements to Duck.ai to help us make it a competitive AI chat alternative for both free and paying users
Implementing sophisticated data processing pipelines that maintain search relevancy
As a Senior Backend Engineer, you'll collaborate remotely with your peers and take responsibility for solving product issues impacting our all-in-one privacy solution, whether large or small. In time, you'll formally mentor other engineers, supporting their career growth and the growth of the Backend Team at DuckDuckGo.
About You
7+ years of professional experience, primarily focused on backend systems that power consumer-facing products
Product acumen to reason about technical tradeoffs in terms of user impact
Familiarity with AI agent tooling: evaluation frameworks, RAG pipelines and prompt engineering
A fundamental understanding of complex data structures and algorithms — you can develop and apply new solutions and confidently navigate and improve existing code.
Data-driven analytical skills for decision-making, stakeholder alignment, and experiment-oriented delivery
Solid project management abilities
Excellent written and verbal communication to validate and articulate decisions
Previous experience leading and mentoring experienced engineers, supporting their career goals, and unlocking their potential.
Compensation
$ 178,500 USD annually and stock options. Compensation is identical within professional levels, regardless of geographic location or team. Compensation for each professional level is transparent across the organization.
Hiring Process
Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Please note that:
You’ll be required to attend meetings on camera via video conferencing
While we offer a flexible work arrangement with no core hours, expect an average full-time commitment of 40 hours per week.
A successful candidate must pass a background check as a condition of joining the team.
Disclosure Statement: Use of AI in Hiring Process
Key Principles:
- Data Privacy: All information provided in your application will be handled in accordance with our Recruiting Privacy Policy. We ensure that your personal information is protected and used solely for recruitment purposes.
#LI-DNI
Engineering - Security Engineering
Who We Are
Your Team and Role
Working on the Security Functional Team, you'll play a pivotal role in ensuring our security capabilities keep pace with our rapid product development, directly protecting our users across all our products. You'll also maintain incident detection and response capabilities for the company, and work on general security related projects. Recent projects include:
Browser security audits
SERP security mitigations
As a Senior Web Security Engineer, Browser Platform, you'll conduct browser security audits (special pages, DuckAI integrations, password manager, etc.), execute on SERP security mitigations (XSS prevention, tooling development to help engineers write safer code), manage application security scanning infrastructure setup (aka SAST/DAST integrations in GitHub), and deliver on Internal red-team operations (simulated attack scenarios), support security triage, and more!
About You
7+ years of experience in web or application security (performing security assessments, vulnerability research, penetration testing, or secure code review)
Advanced programming or scripting experience with JavaScript. Any additional experience with our stack is a bonus: Swift/Kotlin/C#/JavaScript (native apps) or JavaScript/Perl/Go (search).
Experience with at least one WebView technology (WebKit, WebView2, Chromium WebView, etc.) and understanding of browser security models (SOP, CSP, CORS, SameSite cookies)
Hands-on experience identifying and exploiting web vulnerabilities (XSS, CSRF, injection attacks, authorization flaws, etc.)
Familiarity with security testing tools and frameworks
Experience partnering and collaborating with Product Engineers, advising on security matters and helping teams ship secure code faster
Experience shaping how an organisation thinks about security - driving best practices, improving processes, and raising the bar across teams
Compensation
Hiring Process
Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Please note that:
You’ll be required to attend meetings on camera via video conferencing
While we offer a flexible work arrangement with no core hours, expect an average full-time commitment of 40 hours per week.
A successful candidate must pass a background check as a condition of joining the team.
Disclosure Statement: Use of AI in Hiring Process
Key Principles:
#LI-DNI
Marketing - User Insights
Who We Are
Your Team and Role
Working on the User Insights team, you'll lead a group of researchers embedded across DuckDuckGo's product areas, turning user behavior and feedback into decisions that actually ship. The team works across qualitative and quantitative methods, partnering closely with product, data science, and leadership to make sure the right research reaches the right people at the right moments. Recent projects include:
Designing a cross-objective research intake system that surfaced upcoming product decisions 4-6 weeks ahead of roadmap commitments, enabling research to shape outcomes rather than document them.
Running a longitudinal study on AI feature adoption gaps to inform onboarding and acquisition messaging strategy for a major product launch.
Consolidating research findings across multiple objectives into decision-ready briefs, translating user constraints and invalidated assumptions into product language for engineering and design teams.
As a Director, User Insights, you'll set the strategic direction for how research connects to product decisions across the company, making sure the team is working on what matters most, and that the insights they produce actually move things.
About You
15+ years of professional experience, including 4+ years of experience in senior leadership roles (Director, Head, VP levels) in user insights/research.
Deep practitioner-level command of quantitative and qualitative methods: conjoint, MaxDiff, discrete choice, regression, multivariate analysis, moderated/unmoderated testing, diary studies, and metric framework development.
Able to take an ambiguous product question with no established measurement approach and build one from first principles.
Experience working at a consumer-facing tech company with a meaningful US userbase, and cross multiple product surfaces simultaneously.
Background in environments with multiple daily sequenced A/B experiments where research is integrated into the shipping process.
Track record of developing researchers — not just directing them — with measurable improvement in methodology, framing, and stakeholder communication.
Comfort representing research strategy to senior leadership in terms of business outcomes, not just research outputs.
Experience in resource-constrained orgs where sequencing decisions were as important as execution.
Willingness to use AI and build effective workflows accelerating work through AI agents.
Compensation
$243,800 USD annually and stock options. Compensation is identical within professional levels, regardless of geographic location or team. Compensation for each professional level is transparent across the organization.
Hiring Process
Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Please note that:
You’ll be required to attend meetings on camera via video conferencing
Expect to travel at least two times a year: once for our all-hands meetup and again for a team retreat (each around 4-5 days). While extenuating circumstances may impact attendance, everyone is strongly encouraged to attend.
While we offer a flexible work arrangement with no core hours, expect an average full-time commitment of 40 hours per week.
A successful candidate must pass a background check as a condition of joining the team.
By applying for this role, you confirm that all information submitted is accurate and complete. You further acknowledge that providing false or fraudulent information during the application process is cause for denial of an offer, revocation of any existing offer, or other adverse action, up to and including termination after the start of your commencement of work.
Disclosure Statement: Use of AI in Hiring Process
Key Principles:
Data Privacy: All information provided in your application will be handled in accordance with our Recruiting Privacy Policy. We ensure that your personal information is protected and used solely for recruitment purposes.
Human Oversight and Accountability: The AI technology is designed to support our hiring team by providing insights and summaries of applications and evaluations of test projects against scoring rubrics. All final evaluations and hiring decisions, however, will be made by our hiring team, who will consider the AI's input alongside other factors.
Transparency: We believe in transparency regarding our hiring practices. If you have any questions about how AI is used in our recruitment process, please feel free to reach out to us.
Partnerships
Who We Are
Your Team and Role
As a Director, Business Development on the Partnerships team, you’ll lead DuckDuckGo’s most complex AI partnerships and drive strategy — sourcing, negotiating and scaling high-impact deals with model providers, AI infrastructure partners, and emerging players in the agentic ecosystem. These partnerships don't have a playbook yet — you'll be structuring deals where the product, the economics, and the strategic value need to be figured out together, working cross-functionally with Product, Engineering, and Finance to make them real.
You'll manage a portfolio of competing and complementary AI provider relationships, forging partnerships with leading organizations while navigating the strategic tradeoffs of a market where pricing, capabilities, and competitive dynamics shift quarterly. Your work will directly shape how Duck.ai and our AI-powered products evolve and reach millions of users — and how a privacy-first search company competes in the AI landscape.
What Projects Might Look Like
Figuring out further partnerships that could enhance our Duck.ai and Search Assist offerings
Creating new distribution channels to help grow our AI related services
About You
10+ years of Business Development, Partnerships, or Strategic Partnerships experience.
5+ years of cross-functional leadership on partnership projects and teams, including legal and engineering.
Experience with consumer internet or user-facing software business with an understanding of the AI/LLM ecosystem and how AI capabilities are being integrated into consumer products.
Significant experience leading complex product partnerships end-to-end — from identifying the opportunity through deal close and beyond. These should be partnerships where you've created something new together and navigated real product and technical complexity, not sales deals or API licensing.
Self-sufficiency on the commercial details — you don’t wait for someone else to draft terms, build financial models, or pressure-test deal structures — you can handle these details on your own while partnering with Legal and Finance.
Experience managing a portfolio of complex strategic partner relationships and an understanding of the tradeoffs that come with balancing competing and complementary providers.
You build trust quickly with internal teams, partners, and stakeholders you've never worked with before. You're collaborative by default and decisive when it counts.
Located in the US.
Compensation
Hiring Process
Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Please note that:
You’ll be required to attend meetings on camera via video conferencing
While we offer a flexible work arrangement with no core hours, expect an average full-time commitment of 40 hours per week.
A successful candidate must pass a background check as a condition of joining the team.
Disclosure Statement: Use of AI in Hiring Process
Key Principles: