PhD Intern, Software Engineer - Graphics (2026)

Figma is growing our team of passionate creatives and builders on a mission to make design accessible to all. Figmas platform helps teams bring ideas to lifewhether youre brainstorming creating a prototype translating designs into code or iterating with AI. From idea to product Figma empowers teams to streamline workflows move faster and work together in real time from anywhere in the world. If youre excited to shape the future of design and collaboration join us!

The Rendering & Animation team (R&A) builds the graphics engine which renders the canvas for all Figma applications. Our mission is to make rendering performant feature-rich reliable maintainable and extendible across all products & surfaces. The team plays a core bedrock role for the company because it underpins the technology driving the user experience touching many other teams and as such is one of the most impactful areas of Figma.

The R&A team is devoted to hiring individuals with graphics expertise. We are interested in a variety of sub-domains including 2D GPU-driven rendering computational geometry & vector graphics animation frameworks anti-aliasing algorithms shader effects and more recently branching into video/image processing. A PhD Intern specializing in any of these areas would be a phenomenal fit for the team with a lot of exciting projects available. The team is geographically distributed around the US (New York Boston Alabama Michigan Seattle San Francisco and Los Angeles) with the most in-person collaboration happening in New York.

As an intern on our team youll take ownership of a high-impact project at the intersection of your technical strengths and our most pressing graphics rendering or media challenges. Youll work closely with your intern manager team leads and collaborators across 12 partner teams to deliver tangible results within your internship. This is an opportunity to do significant portfolio-worthy work that directly supplies Figmas visual platform.

This position is eligible for Winter or Summer of 2026 in either San Francisco or New York hub.

What youll do at Figma:

• Learn from industry graphics engineers
• Collaborate with your intern manager and team members to finalize the project goals and clarify the project requirements design architecture and achievements
• Participate as a member of the Rendering & Animation team writing code tests and documentation fixing bugs attending the weekly team meeting and communicating progress updates
• Contribute to exciting domain areas; some examples: crafting and optimizing shaders for sophisticated effects investigating improvements to anti-aliasing algorithms evolving physics-based motion frameworks improving media processing capabilities animating spline interpolation and more!

Wed love to hear from you if you have:

• Ph.D in Computer Graphics or Media Processing in their 4-5th year
• Experience working with OpenGL WebGL WebGPU and their respective shader languages (GLSL WGSL) or other low-level graphics APIs like Vulkan & Metal
• Experience in C
• Self-motivated initiative to deliver value and think holistically about the use-case as well as the low-level technology

While its not required its an added plus if you also have:

• Experience in WebAssembly and web graphics environments
• Experience in 2D graphics
• Experience in performance optimization
• Experience or curiosity about art & design applications

At Figma one of our values is Grow as you go. We believe in hiring smart curious people who are excited to learn and develop their skills. If youre excited about this role but your past experience doesnt align perfectly with the points outlined in the job description we encourage you to apply anyways. You may be just the right candidate for this or other roles.

At Figma we celebrate and support our differences. We know employing a team rich in diverse thoughts experiences and opinions allows our employees our product and our community to flourish. Figma is an equal opportunity workplace - we are dedicated to equal employment opportunities regardless of race color ancestry religion sex national origin sexual orientation age citizenship marital status disability gender identity/expression veteran status or any other characteristic protected by law. We also consider qualified applicants regardless of criminal histories consistent with legal requirements.

We will work to ensure individuals with disabilities are provided reasonable accommodation to apply for a role participate in the interview process perform essential job functions and receive other benefits and privileges of employment. If you require accommodation please reach out to . These modifications enable an individual with a disability to have an equal opportunity not only to get a job but successfully perform their job tasks to the same extent as people without disabilities.

Examples of accommodations include but are not limited to:

• Holding interviews in an accessible location
• Enabling closed captioning on video conferencing
• Ensuring all written communication be compatible with screen readers
• Changing the mode or format of interviews

To ensure the integrity of our hiring process and facilitate a more personal connection we require all candidates keep their cameras on during video interviews. Additionally if hired you will be required to attend in person onboarding.

By applying for this job the candidate acknowledges and agrees that any personal data contained in their application or supporting materials will be processed in accordance with Figmas Candidate Privacy Notice.