Founding Engineer job title trend since Apr 2011
Engineering · Established · in 6.2% of HN hiring posts · 1 open roles at 1 company · median $225k · first seen Jul 2011
Who is hiring for it
Open postings on their own job boards, read 22h ago1 of 1 companies
| # | Company | Open roles | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  Datadog | 1 |
Open roles
| Role | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Datadog for Startups Founding Engineering LeadDatadogSan Francisco, California, USA$200k to $250k | Datadog | San Francisco, California, USA | $200k to $250k |
Share of Hacker News hiring posts
1,256 posts since Apr 2011 · -2% in 6 monthsSeptember 2026 14 of 256 postings, 5.5%
Related titles
About this title
One of a startup's first engineers, usually with equity and a wide remit.
Also counted: first engineer, early engineer
First sighting
San Francisco (Founding Engineer, H1B, Full-Time) rippleQ: we're applying social and game mechanics...
Median posted salary $225k from 1 postings that state a base pay range (the median of their midpoints, USD a year). Not a survey of what people earn.
Sources: Hacker News Who is hiring threads and about 130 public job boards, read weekly. A title's share is not the job market's size. Logos via logo.dev; trademarks belong to their owners.