Back to jobs
New

Staff Machine Learning Engineer

San Francisco, CA

About This Role

Strava is the app for active people. With over 150 million athletes in more than 190 countries, it’s more than tracking workouts—it’s where connection, motivation, and personal bests thrive. No matter your activity, gear, or goals, Strava’s got you covered. Find your crew, crush your milestones, and keep moving forward. Start your journey with Strava today.

We are looking for a Staff Machine Learning Engineer to join the growing AI and Machine Learning team at Strava. This team is responsible for sophisticated machine learning models and systems that power key Strava experiences which provide value to our athletes including personalization, recommendation, search, and trust and safety.

This is a leadership role in the ML team and across Product teams designing, roadmapping and implementing innovative machine learning algorithms. We value full stack ML engineers who are able to work on all parts of an ML pipeline from model building, evaluation, optimizing performance, and ensuring the scalability and reliability of these production models.

We follow a flexible hybrid model that generally translates to around half your time on-site in our San Francisco Office—roughly three days per week. 

You’re excited about this opportunity because you will:

  • Build for a Well Loved Consumer Product: Work at the intersection of AI and fitness to launch and optimize product experiences that will be used by tens of millions of active people worldwide
  • Own End to End AI Systems: Lead key projects powered by ML on the Strava platform end-to-end, from initial model prototyping to shipping production code to scaling and optimizing inference and deployment
  • Shape AI at Strava: Be a leadership voice and mentor on a highly collaborative team with a range of experience levels. Lead across teams to deploy ML solutions in multiple surfaces.
  • Innovate in AI for Fitness: Design and develop novel models and methodologies to take on novel problems in that improve athlete experience, including recommendation systems, activity prediction, and personalized insights
  • Build from a rich dataset: Explore and use Strava’s extensive unique fitness and geo datasets from millions of users to extract actionable insights, inform product decisions, and optimize existing features

You will be successful here by:

  • Setting AI technical vision: Build, foster and expand the influence of AI here at Strava through understanding and collaboration with partners across teams set technical strategies for delivering impact through AI.
  • Driving innovation with Product in mind: Stay up-to-date with the latest research in machine learning, AI, and related fields. Experiment, advocate and get support for innovative techniques to improve existing products or explore new features that result in step function changes to how we build AI .
  • Raising the ML standard: Mentor engineers to shape how we do ML at Strava. Drive best practices for model development, deployment, and maintenance and be a go-to source of knowledge of the field.
  • Collaborating in and across teams: Build relationships, advocate and connect with cross-org partners and product verticals understand needs, and build systems to bring your technical vision to life.
  • Leading as an Owner: Owning your work end-to-end and being accountable for the outcomes in the projects you lead, influencing the ML team, partner teams and landing impact for the business. Ensure the end to end system delivers as expected.
  • Analyzing the Data: Work closely with product managers, data scientists, and engineers to find opportunities for applying machine learning to drive impact and enhance Strava’s features and measure impact.
  • Being passionate about the work you are doing and contributing positively to Strava’s inclusive and collaborative team culture and values

We’re excited about you because:

  • Have worked on complex, ambiguous machine learning problems and broken them down into manageable tasks with both strategies and tactical execution.
  • Demonstrated technical leadership in leading large projects and the ability to mentor and grow team members of all levels.
  • Have demonstrated strong interpersonal and communication skills, and collaborative approach to drive strategies and drive business impact across teams.
  • Have experience building, shipping, and supporting ML models in production at scale
  • Have experience with exploratory data analysis and model prototyping, using languages such as Python or R and tools like Scikit learn, Pandas, Numpy, Pytorch, Sagemaker
  • Have built and worked on data pipelines using large scale data technologies (like Spark, Hadoop, EMR, SQL, Snowflake)
  • Are experienced and interested in production ML model operational excellence and best practices, like automated model retraining, performance monitoring, feature logging, A/B testing
  • Have built backend production services on cloud environments like AWS, using languages like (but not limited to) Ruby, Java, Scala, Python, Go

Compensation Overview:

At Strava, we know our employees are the most important ingredient to our success, and our compensation and total rewards programs reflect that. We take a market-based approach to pay, and pay may vary depending on the department and your location. Salary ranges are categorized into one of three tiers based on a cost of labor index for that geographic area. We will determine the candidate’s starting pay based on job-related skills, experience, qualifications, work location, and market conditions. We may modify these ranges in the future. For more information, please contact your talent partner.

Compensation: $230,000 - $260,000. The base salary posted is within the compensation range for this role. This range reflects base pay only and does not include equity, or benefits. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range for your location during the hiring process.

For more information on benefits, please click here.

About Strava

Strava is Swedish for “strive,” which epitomizes who we are and what we do. We’re a passionate and committed team, unified by our mission to connect athletes to what motivates them and help them find their personal best. With billions of activity uploads from all over the world, we have a humbling and adventurous vision: to be the record of the world’s athletic activities and the technology that makes every effort count.

Strava builds software that makes the best part of our athletes’ days even better. Just as we’re deeply committed to unlocking their potential, we’re dedicated to providing a world-class, inclusive workplace where our employees can grow and thrive, too. We’re backed by Sequoia Capital, TCV, Madrone Partners and Jackson Square Ventures, and we’re expanding in order to exceed the needs of our growing community of global athletes. Our culture reflects our community. We are continuously striving to hire and engage diverse teammates from all backgrounds, experiences and perspectives because we know we are a stronger team together.

Despite challenges in the world around us, we are continuing to grow camaraderie and positivity within our culture. We are differentiated by our truly people-first approach, our compassionate leadership, and our belief that we can bring joy and inspiration to athletes’ lives — now more than ever. All to say, it’s a great time to join Strava!

Strava is an equal opportunity employer. In keeping with the values of Strava, we make all employment decisions including hiring, evaluation, termination, promotional and training opportunities, without regard to race, religion, color, sex, age, national origin, ancestry, sexual orientation, physical handicap, mental disability, medical condition, disability, gender or identity or expression, pregnancy or pregnancy-related condition, marital status, height and/or weight.

We will ensure that individuals with disabilities are provided reasonable accommodation to participate in the job application or interview process, to perform essential job functions, and to receive other benefits and privileges of employment. Please contact us to request accommodation.

California Consumer Protection Act Applicant Notice

Apply for this job

*

indicates a required field

Resume/CV*

Accepted file types: pdf, doc, docx, txt, rtf

Cover Letter

Accepted file types: pdf, doc, docx, txt, rtf

Select...
Select...
Select...
Select...

Voluntary Self-Identification

For government reporting purposes, we ask candidates to respond to the below self-identification survey. Completion of the form is entirely voluntary. Whatever your decision, it will not be considered in the hiring process or thereafter. Any information that you do provide will be recorded and maintained in a confidential file.

As set forth in Strava’s Equal Employment Opportunity policy, we do not discriminate on the basis of any protected group status under any applicable law.

Select...
Select...
Race & Ethnicity Definitions

If you believe you belong to any of the categories of protected veterans listed below, please indicate by making the appropriate selection. As a government contractor subject to the Vietnam Era Veterans Readjustment Assistance Act (VEVRAA), we request this information in order to measure the effectiveness of the outreach and positive recruitment efforts we undertake pursuant to VEVRAA. Classification of protected categories is as follows:

A "disabled veteran" is one of the following: a veteran of the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service who is entitled to compensation (or who but for the receipt of military retired pay would be entitled to compensation) under laws administered by the Secretary of Veterans Affairs; or a person who was discharged or released from active duty because of a service-connected disability.

A "recently separated veteran" means any veteran during the three-year period beginning on the date of such veteran's discharge or release from active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval, or air service.

An "active duty wartime or campaign badge veteran" means a veteran who served on active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service during a war, or in a campaign or expedition for which a campaign badge has been authorized under the laws administered by the Department of Defense.

An "Armed forces service medal veteran" means a veteran who, while serving on active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service, participated in a United States military operation for which an Armed Forces service medal was awarded pursuant to Executive Order 12985.

Select...

Voluntary Self-Identification of Disability

Form CC-305
Page 1 of 1
OMB Control Number 1250-0005
Expires 04/30/2026

Why are you being asked to complete this form?

We are a federal contractor or subcontractor. The law requires us to provide equal employment opportunity to qualified people with disabilities. We have a goal of having at least 7% of our workers as people with disabilities. The law says we must measure our progress towards this goal. To do this, we must ask applicants and employees if they have a disability or have ever had one. People can become disabled, so we need to ask this question at least every five years.

Completing this form is voluntary, and we hope that you will choose to do so. Your answer is confidential. No one who makes hiring decisions will see it. Your decision to complete the form and your answer will not harm you in any way. If you want to learn more about the law or this form, visit the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) website at www.dol.gov/ofccp.

How do you know if you have a disability?

A disability is a condition that substantially limits one or more of your “major life activities.” If you have or have ever had such a condition, you are a person with a disability. Disabilities include, but are not limited to:

  • Alcohol or other substance use disorder (not currently using drugs illegally)
  • Autoimmune disorder, for example, lupus, fibromyalgia, rheumatoid arthritis, HIV/AIDS
  • Blind or low vision
  • Cancer (past or present)
  • Cardiovascular or heart disease
  • Celiac disease
  • Cerebral palsy
  • Deaf or serious difficulty hearing
  • Diabetes
  • Disfigurement, for example, disfigurement caused by burns, wounds, accidents, or congenital disorders
  • Epilepsy or other seizure disorder
  • Gastrointestinal disorders, for example, Crohn's Disease, irritable bowel syndrome
  • Intellectual or developmental disability
  • Mental health conditions, for example, depression, bipolar disorder, anxiety disorder, schizophrenia, PTSD
  • Missing limbs or partially missing limbs
  • Mobility impairment, benefiting from the use of a wheelchair, scooter, walker, leg brace(s) and/or other supports
  • Nervous system condition, for example, migraine headaches, Parkinson’s disease, multiple sclerosis (MS)
  • Neurodivergence, for example, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), autism spectrum disorder, dyslexia, dyspraxia, other learning disabilities
  • Partial or complete paralysis (any cause)
  • Pulmonary or respiratory conditions, for example, tuberculosis, asthma, emphysema
  • Short stature (dwarfism)
  • Traumatic brain injury
Select...

PUBLIC BURDEN STATEMENT: According to the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 no persons are required to respond to a collection of information unless such collection displays a valid OMB control number. This survey should take about 5 minutes to complete.