Frontend Software Engineer, Auth
Software Engineering · Full-time
Washington, USA · New York, USA · Los Angeles, TX, USA · New York, NY, USA · Seattle, WA, USA · Austin, QC, Canada
USD 175k-275k / year
Posted on Oct 30, 2026
Frontend Software Engineer, Auth
New York, NY • Seattle, WA • Los Angeles, CA • Austin, TX
Software Engineering
In office
Full-time
About Nominal
Nominal is building the connected test and operations platform powering the world's most advanced hardware systems, from spacecraft and autonomous vehicles to next-generation defense programs. Our platform gives hardware engineering teams a single place to ingest data, analyze performance, automate test execution, and collaborate across every phase of development, so they can move faster without sacrificing safety or precision. We're a fast-moving team that owns problems end-to-end, works across disciplines, and thrives at the intersection of hardware and software.
We serve top-tier commercial and defense customers, from autonomy leaders like Anduril and Shield AI to next-generation aerospace teams like Hermeus and REGENT, and performance engineering teams like Pratt Miller Motorsports, alongside mission partners within the U.S. Navy and U.S. Air Force on programs where failure isn't an option. We're backed by Sequoia, General Catalyst, Founders Fund, Lux Capital, and Lightspeed. Our team draws from SpaceX, Palantir, Anduril, Applied Intuition, and other leading companies, united by a common mission: giving hardware engineers the tools to build the future with speed, safety, and confidence.
Join Nominal as a Frontend Software Engineer, Auth
At Nominal, the frontend goes far beyond a visual layer on top of APIs. For the Auth team, it's where administrators decide who can see and change sensitive test data, and where every user learns what they're allowed to do and why. Our customers run programs where the wrong person seeing the wrong data is a serious problem, so access control has to be precise, and the interface has to make that precision clear.
We're looking for engineers who love reasoning about permission models as much as building intuitive interfaces. You'll work at the intersection of product, design, and engineering to turn a relationship-based authorization system into tools that let admins control access with confidence and let users understand exactly why they can or can't see something. Success in this role is measured by building products that make a precise, deny-by-default permission model legible without hiding its power.
You'll partner closely with backend engineers, designers, and product teams to define workflows, shape product direction, and make thoughtful technical tradeoffs in an environment where requirements are often ambiguous and the best solutions aren't immediately obvious. You'll own the auth frontend largely end to end, so your judgment will shape how access control feels across the whole product.
🚀 About the role
Design products around access control
Build the interfaces administrators use to assign roles, manage users and groups, create workspaces, issue and revoke API keys, and control which data sources each person can see. You'll help define the workflows and interaction patterns that make a relationship-based permission model understandable and hard to misconfigure.
Make permissions visible across the product
Bring the permission model into every part of the app so that what users see matches what they're allowed to do, from hiding actions they can't take to explaining why. You'll also build the sign-in experiences that connect Nominal to customers' enterprise identity providers.
Own ambiguous product problems
Partner closely with product, design, and engineering to turn loosely defined ideas into intuitive user experiences. You'll challenge assumptions, validate workflows directly with users, and make confident product decisions when requirements are incomplete.
Build systems, not just screens
Develop scalable frontend architecture using React, TypeScript, and modern web technologies. You'll work across application state, data fetching, rendering, and performance to support complex workflows and large datasets.
Make complexity feel simple
Design experiences that expose powerful capabilities without overwhelming users. You'll think deeply about information architecture, interaction design, and how technical users reason about their work.
Success in this role comes from combining strong frontend engineering with product judgment. You'll spend as much time thinking about how users reason about complex systems as you will writing React code.
🙌 We'd love to hear from you if you have
- 3 to 8 years experience building products for technical users where you’ve been involved in authentication, access control, or similar security domains.
- Strong experience with TypeScript, and modern frontend architecture, along with an understanding of how frontend systems interact with backend services.
- Experience building products involving industry-standard authentication flows or working with open source authorization systems such as AuthZed / SpiceDB.
- Strong product instincts. You naturally ask "Why are we building this?" before "How should I implement it?" and aren't afraid to challenge assumptions when you believe there's a better solution for users.
- A systems mindset. You enjoy reasoning about data models, user workflows, and how complex systems should behave before jumping into implementation.
- Excellent communication skills and the ability to explain technical and product tradeoffs clearly across engineering, design, and product teams.
⚡ Skills that supercharge us
Authorization Systems
Experience with role-based or relationship-based access control, and familiarity with SpiceDB or other Zanzibar-style authorization engines.
Identity & Authentication
Comfort with sign-in flows, session management, and enterprise identity standards such as OIDC and SAML.
Security-Minded Design
Experience making permission models understandable to end users, or designing interfaces where correctness has real consequences.
Systems Thinking
Experience designing products around complex object models, relationships, and workflows rather than simple CRUD interfaces.
Product Thinking
Ability to understand user goals, simplify complicated workflows, and make thoughtful product decisions under ambiguity.
Frontend Architecture
Strong experience with React, TypeScript, modern state management, asynchronous data flows, and scalable application architecture.
Backend Collaboration
Comfort reasoning about APIs, data loading strategies, backend constraints, and making architectural tradeoffs across the full stack.
Performance Engineering
Experience optimizing rendering, managing large datasets, virtualized interfaces, streaming updates, caching strategies, and browser performance.
✨ Benefits/Perks
- 🏥 100% coverage of medical, dental, and vision insurance
- 🏖️ Unlimited PTO and sick leave
- 🍽️ Free lunch, snacks, and coffee
- 🚀 Professional Development Stipend
- ✈️ Annual company retreat
All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or national origin.
ITAR Requirements
To conform to U.S. Government export regulations, applicant must be a (i) U.S. citizen or national, (ii) U.S. lawful, permanent resident (aka green card holder), (iii) Refugee under 8 U.S.C. § 1157, or (iv) Asylee under 8 U.S.C. § 1158, or be eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State. Learn more about the ITAR here.
Compensation
The base pay range for this role is $175,000 – $275,000 per year.
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This position requires access to information and technology that is subject to U.S. export controls. Your responses to the questions below will be used solely to determine your eligibility under U.S. law to receive information and materials subject to U.S. export controls. Are you any of the following “protected individual(s)” as defined in the Immigration and Naturalization Act, 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3)? *
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Will you require sponsorship from Nominal for employment now or in the future? (e.g, OPT, H1B visa)? *
Clearance Eligibility - Do you presently hold an active U.S. security clearance, or are you eligible to obtain and maintain a U.S. security clearance? *
If you have held a U.S. security clearance in the past, what clearance level have you held? *
This position requires 5 days in office. Are you able to work 5 days in office in either NYC, LA, Austin, or Seattle? *
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To comply with government reporting requirements, we invite candidates to participate in the self-identification survey below. Your completion of this form is entirely optional, and your decision will neither influence the hiring process nor any subsequent stages. Any information you choose to share will be kept confidential and stored in a secure file. As outlined in our Equal Employment Opportunity policy, we uphold a commitment to non-discrimination based on any protected group status specified in applicable laws.
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Disabled veteran
A veteran who served on active duty in the U.S. military and is entitled to disability compensation (or who but for the receipt of military retired pay would be entitled to disability compensation) under laws administered by the Secretary of Veterans Affairs, or was discharged or released from active duty because of a service-connected disabilityRecently separated veteran
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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 (61 Fed. Reg. 1209).Veteran status
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Req ID: R161
