Senior Frontend Engineer - Design System Core - React/React Native

Location: Sydney, au

Job Description

Join the team redefining how the world experiences design.
Hey, g’day, mabuhay, kia ora, 你好, hallo, vítejte!

Thanks for stopping by. We know job hunting can be a little time consuming, and you’re probably keen to find out what’s on offer — so we’ll get straight to the point.

Where and how you can work

Our flagship campus is in Sydney. We also have a campus in Melbourne and co-working spaces in Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide. But you have choice in where and how you work — we trust our Canvanauts to choose the balance that empowers them and their team to achieve their goals.

What you’d be doing in this role

As Canva scales, change continues to be part of our DNA. But we like to think that’s all part of the fun. This will give you a flavour of the kind of work you’ll be doing when you start, but it will likely evolve over time.

At the moment, this role is focused on:

• Owning the standards, layout primitives, testing tooling, and cross-platform utilities that underpin Easel and the broader frontend codebase
• Driving large-scale technical quality improvements across the frontend ecosystem — from defining migration strategies through to adoption at scale
• Partnering closely with product teams to understand pain points, identify opportunities, and connect solutions to broader platform goals
• Codifying and sharing best practices through clear documentation, presentations, and internal engagement across the frontend specialty
• Supporting and mentoring teammates through thoughtful feedback, knowledge sharing, and capability uplift initiatives
• Contributing to hiring by interviewing candidates, calibrating decisions, and helping maintain a high engineering bar

You’re probably a match if

• You have strong commercial experience with TypeScript and React & React Native, alongside deep expertise in CSS architecture and modern web platform APIs. Experience with React Native is a bonus
• You’ve solved infrastructure or migration challenges at scale — such as UI testing infrastructure, component migrations, or frontend platform modernization
• You bring a systems-level perspective and think beyond individual components to the standards, tooling, and practices that shape an entire frontend ecosystem
• You care deeply about developer experience and user adoption, not just technical implementation
• You’re curious about how AI tooling — including LLMs, agentic workflows, and MCP — is reshaping the way engineers build and consume design systems
• You’re a collaborative communicator who enjoys influencing across teams and driving alignment in complex technical environments

About the team

A design system is a collection of design guidelines, reusable UI components, and the tools that help teams create consistent experiences at scale.

At Canva, our design system teams share a mission to build world-class foundations that empower Canvanauts to craft seamless, high-quality experiences for millions of users around the globe. Design System Evolution sits at the frontier of that mission — expanding the design system into new surfaces and use cases, enabling emerging technologies, and setting technical standards for the frontend specialty. The team also owns foundational infrastructure at the intersection of design systems and scalable UI platforms.

What’s in it for you?

Achieving our crazy big goals motivates us to work hard — and we do — but you’ll experience plenty of moments of magic, connection, and fun along the way. We also offer a range of benefits to support you both inside and outside of work.

Here’s a taste of what’s on offer:

• Equity packages — we want our success to be yours too
• Inclusive parental leave that supports all parents and carers
• An annual Vibe & Thrive allowance to support your wellbeing, social connection, office setup, and more
• Flexible leave options that empower you to recharge, give back, and take care of what matters most to you

Check out lifeatcanva.com for more info.

Other stuff to know

We make hiring decisions based on your experience, skills, and passion, as well as how you can enhance Canva and our culture. When you apply, please tell us the pronouns you use and any reasonable adjustments you may need during the interview process.

We celebrate all types of skills and backgrounds at Canva, so even if you don’t feel like your experience perfectly matches what’s listed above, we’d still love to hear from you.

Please note that interviews are conducted virtually.

Based on Canva’s Job Advertisement template and tone guidelines.