Senior Systems Engineer (C/C++), Exchange Core

Job description

ABOUT POLYMARKET Polymarket is the world’s largest prediction market platform. We enable individuals to express views on real-world events by trading on outcomes across politics, economics, sports, culture, and current affairs. Built as a peer-to-peer marketplace with no centralized “house,” Polymarket aggregates diverse opinions into transparent, market-based probabilities that reflect collective expectations about the future. We’re growing fast: both in volume ($21B traded in 2025) and in adoption as an alternative news source. Our ambition is to become a ubiquitous beacon of truth in global media, powered by fast, reliable, and deeply technical market infrastructure. ABOUT THE ROLE Polymarket is looking for a core C/C++ engineer to help build and scale our exchange infrastructure. This is a low-latency, high-throughput systems role focused on the heart of Polymarket’s trading engine. You’ll work on performance-critical components that directly impact market quality, reliability, and speed. You’ll operate with high ownership and minimal bureaucracy, collaborating closely with other senior engineers to design, implement, and optimize systems that must be correct, fast, and resilient under real-world load. WHAT YOU’LL DO We’re looking for an experienced individual contributor who enjoys solving hard systems problems and pushing performance limits. - Build the exchange core: Design and implement low-latency, high-throughput components of Polymarket’s trading and matching infrastructure using C/C++. - Optimize for speed & scale: Profile, tune, and debug performance-critical systems, with a relentless focus on latency, throughput, and determinism. - Design robust systems: Develop efficient algorithms and data structures, and build scalable messaging and event-driven systems (e.g. Kafka or similar). - Own reliability & correctness: Reinforce the security, availability, performance, and scalability of core exchange systems through careful design, testing, and operational rigor. - Collaborate deeply: Work closely with engineers across product, infra, and data to ensure tight integration between the exchange and the rest of the platform. - Contribute to engineering excellence: Participate in design reviews, code reviews, and architectural discussions to maintain a high bar for quality across the codebase. WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR - 5+ years of professional C/C++ experience with deep knowledge of algorithms, data structures, and low-level performance optimization. - Proven experience building or operating low-latency, high-throughput, scalable systems in production environments. - Strong problem-solving skills, comfort working on complex systems end-to-end, and an entrepreneurial mindset. - (Plus) Background in finance, trading systems, networking, or exchange infrastructure - (Plus) Experience with multithreading, lock-free programming, and advanced optimization techniques - (Plus) Familiarity with distributed messaging systems (Kafka or similar) BENEFITS - Competitive salary & equity - Unlimited PTO - Full Health, Vision, & Dental coverage - 401k match - Hardware setup — new MacBook Pro, big display, & accessories