Research Engineer (Pretraining)

• Anthropic is at the forefront of AI research, dedicated to developing safe, ethical, and powerful artificial intelligence
• Our mission is to ensure that transformative AI systems are aligned with human interests
• We are seeking a Research Engineer to join our Pretraining team, responsible for developing the next generation of large language models
• In this role, you will work at the intersection of cutting-edge research and practical engineering, contributing to the development of safe, steerable, and trustworthy AI systems
• Conduct research and implement solutions in areas such as model architecture, algorithms, data processing, and optimizer development
• Independently lead small research projects while collaborating with team members on larger initiatives
• Design, run, and analyze scientific experiments to advance our understanding of large language models
• Optimize and scale our training infrastructure to improve efficiency and reliability
• Develop and improve dev tooling to enhance team productivity
• Contribute to the entire stack, from low-level optimizations to high-level model design
• Sample Projects:
• Optimizing the throughput of novel attention mechanisms
• Comparing compute efficiency of different Transformer variants
• Preparing large-scale datasets for efficient model consumption
• Scaling distributed training jobs to thousands of GPUs
• Designing fault tolerance strategies for our training infrastructure
• Creating interactive visualizations of model internals, such as attention patterns

Benefits

• Comprehensive health, dental, and vision insurance for you and your dependents

• Inclusive fertility benefits via Carrot Fertility

• 22 weeks of paid parental leave

• Flexible paid time off and absence policies

• Mental health support for you and your dependents

• Competitive salary and equity packages

• Optional equity donation matching at a 1:1 ratio, up to 25% of your equity grant

• Retirement plans with competitive matching

• Life and income protection plans

• $500/month flexible wellness and time saver stipend

• Commuter benefits

• Annual education stipend

• Home office stipends

• Relocation support for those moving for Anthropic

• Daily meals and snacks in the office

• Advanced degree (MS or PhD) in Computer Science, Machine Learning, or a related field

• Excellent communication skills and ability to work in a collaborative environment

• Expertise in Python and experience with deep learning frameworks (PyTorch preferred)

• Strong software engineering skills with a proven track record of building complex systems

• Care about the societal impacts of your work

• Ability to balance research goals with practical engineering constraints

• Familiarity with large-scale machine learning, particularly in the context of language models

• Strong problem-solving skills and a results-oriented mindset

• Familiarity with GPUs, Kubernetes, and OS internals

• Work on high-performance, large-scale ML systems

• Experience with language modeling using transformer architectures

• Background in large-scale ETL processes

• Knowledge of reinforcement learning techniques

• Willingly take on tasks outside your job description to support the team

• Are enthusiastic to work at an organization that functions as a single, cohesive team pursuing large-scale AI research projects

• Enjoy pair programming and collaborative work

• Are working to align state of the art models with human values and preferences, understand and interpret deep neural networks, or develop new models to support these areas of research

• View research and engineering as two sides of the same coin, and seek to understand all aspects of our research program as well as possible, to maximize the impact of your insights

• Have significant software engineering experience

• Are eager to learn more about machine learning research

• Have ambitious goals for AI safety and general progress in the next few years, and you’re working to create the best outcomes over the long-term

• Are results-oriented with a bias towards flexibility and impact

• We require at least a Bachelor’s degree in a related field or equivalent experience

• We encourage you to apply even if you do not believe you meet every single qualification. Not all strong candidates will meet every single qualification as listed