Best Async-First Remote Engineering Jobs (and How to Land One)

Software engineering might be the most async-friendly job there is. Long before "async" became a workplace buzzword, engineers were already working this way. Code review happens in writing. Design decisions live in documents. The whole discipline is built on version control, pull requests, and issue trackers — and all of them are asynchronous by design.

That's why so many of the world's most respected async-first companies are engineering-heavy, and why remote async engineering jobs are consistently one of the deepest, most reliable categories on the board.

If you do your best work in long, uninterrupted stretches rather than back-to-back meetings, this is the kind of role built for you.

Ready to skip straight to openings? Browse all remote async engineering jobs →

Why Engineering Is the Perfect Async Job

Most jobs have to be reshaped to work asynchronously. Engineering doesn't — it already runs on written, self-documenting tools. A few reasons it fits so naturally:

• Code review is asynchronous by default. A pull request is a written proposal. A reviewer reads it and responds when it suits them. No meeting required.
• The work rewards deep focus. Shipping a feature or solving a hard bug takes long, uninterrupted stretches, not a calendar chopped into calls. Async protects exactly that.
• The artifacts carry the context. Clear commits, design docs, and tickets mean an engineer in one time zone can pick up where another left off — without ever being online at the same time.
• Output is easy to measure. Merged code, closed issues, and shipped features are visible proof of work. That's why async-first companies are comfortable judging engineers on results instead of hours online.

In practice, this is real freedom. Because you're measured by what you ship, you can start early and finish by mid-afternoon to pick up your kids, take a walk when you hit a wall, or do your deepest work at night — as long as the code lands.

New to how all this works? Our guide to what asynchronous communication is explains the basics, and async vs. synchronous work covers the trade-offs.

Async-First Companies Hiring Engineers Right Now

These are async-first companies with genuinely deep engineering teams, where written-first, remote collaboration is the default rather than a perk. Each one links to its live openings and company profile.

GitLab

GitLab is widely considered the gold standard of async work. It runs thousands of employees across dozens of countries almost entirely on documentation, including one of the most comprehensive public handbooks on the internet. Its engineering team is huge and always hiring — backend, frontend, and infrastructure. See GitLab's open roles →

Docker

Docker builds tools nearly every modern developer touches, and the company itself is globally distributed and async-first. Engineering roles span backend services, developer tooling, and cloud infrastructure. See Docker's open roles →

Supabase

The open-source Firebase alternative runs almost entirely through GitHub, written proposals, and documentation instead of meetings — a textbook async engineering environment. A strong fit if you like open source and working in the open. See Supabase's open roles →

Those three are the engineering-heaviest names on the board today. To see every async-first company currently hiring, browse all company profiles →

Types of Remote Async Engineering Roles

"Engineering" covers a lot of ground. On the engineering hub you'll find all of these, newest first:

• Backend engineering — APIs, services, and databases: the systems behind everything. Deeply async, since most of it is independent problem-solving.
• Frontend engineering — user interfaces and client-side apps, usually built alongside design through written specs and Figma comments.
• Full-stack engineering — both ends of the stack, common at smaller async-first startups where engineers own features end to end.
• DevOps & SRE — infrastructure, reliability, and deployment. Incidents sometimes need real-time coordination, but most of it is deep, independent work.
• Platform & security engineering — internal tooling, developer experience, and application security, all documentation-driven by nature.

How Much Do Remote Async Engineers Make?

Remote software engineers in the US typically earn between $100,000 and $180,000 a year, with senior, staff, and principal roles going well beyond that. Async-first companies that hire globally sometimes adjust pay for location, but many pay competitive rates wherever you live — a real advantage of working somewhere that hires beyond a single city or country. Where a company publishes a range, the listing shows it or links to the careers page that does.

Experience level moves the number more than anything else. If you're further along, the senior remote async jobs hub filters straight to senior and up.

The Trade-Offs to Know

Async engineering suits a lot of people, but it isn't effortless — and being honest about that helps you decide if it's for you.

• Your writing carries you. On an async team, unclear writing creates real confusion. If you'd rather talk everything through on a call, the adjustment is real.
• Feedback can be slower. A question you'd answer in ten seconds at a shared desk might wait a few hours for a reply across time zones.
• You manage yourself. Nobody is watching the clock, which is freeing — and, if you struggle with structure, occasionally daunting.

Most engineers find the trade worth it: fewer meetings and far more control over your day, in exchange for writing well and working independently.

How to Land an Async Engineering Job

Async hiring rewards slightly different things than a traditional office interview. Here's what actually moves the needle.

Make your writing excellent

On an async team, your writing is your presence. Clear pull-request descriptions, well-argued proposals, and self-contained updates are the daily craft — so a specific, well-written application (not a generic one) is itself a work sample. Sloppy writing costs you in a way it rarely does at an office job.

Build a public portfolio

GitHub projects, open-source contributions, and technical writing let a hiring manager evaluate you on their own time — exactly how async teams like to work. A strong public trail often matters more than a résumé, and at open-source-first companies like Supabase, contributing to the project is a direct audition.

Show that you can run yourself

Async companies trust engineers to manage their own work. In your application and interviews, point to times you drove a project without hand-holding, made a call with incomplete information, or documented something so clearly that nobody had to ask you about it.

Expect a written or take-home process

Async-first companies lean on take-home assignments and written interview stages rather than back-to-back live panels. Treat them as the real thing — they're testing whether you can do focused, independent, well-documented work, because that's the job.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is an async engineering job?

It's a remote software role at a company that works mostly in writing — pull requests, documents, and issue trackers — instead of real-time meetings. You're judged on what you ship, not the hours you're online, which usually means flexible hours and little or no required time-zone overlap.

Which companies hire remote async engineers?

Async-first companies with deep engineering teams include GitLab, Docker, and Supabase. You can see every async-first company currently hiring on the Working Async companies page.

Do async engineering jobs require time-zone overlap?

Many remote jobs still expect some overlap, but true async-first companies keep it low or zero. Standups become written updates and decisions live in documents, so you can do deep work on the schedule that suits you. Each listing states any overlap it expects.

How do I get a remote engineering job with no experience?

Skip the résumé arms race and build public proof instead. Pick a project you actually use, find its "good first issue" tickets, and land a few merged pull requests. One small project you shipped and documented tells an async hiring manager more than a list of coursework — because it shows the exact independent, written work the job is made of.

Start Browsing Async Engineering Roles

Every engineering job on Working Async comes from a company that genuinely works asynchronously, and each listing spells out any time-zone or core-hours expectations up front before linking you straight to the company's own application page.

→ Browse all remote async engineering jobs

→ Filter to senior engineering roles

→ Explore the async-first companies behind them

If you write code and want to be judged by what you ship, not when you're online, this is where those jobs live.