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Startup Engineer Jobs in Virginia (NOW HIRING)

Cheez

Product Manager @ Social app startup

Richmond, VA · On-site

Collaborate with the Founder/CEO, Engineering & Design team (ex-Google/Apple/Facebook/Microsoft) to ... Ability to thrive in a fast-paced, dynamic startup environment * Eagerness to learn, adapt, and ...

Cheez

Collaborate with the Founder/CEO, Engineering & Design team (ex-Google/Apple/Facebook/Microsoft) to ... Ability to thrive in a fast-paced, dynamic startup environment * Eagerness to learn, adapt, and ...

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All JobsStartup Engineer JobsStartup Engineer Jobs in Virginia

Startup Engineer information

See Virginia salary details

$38.7K

$100.9K

$136.3K

How much do startup engineer jobs pay per year?

As of Jul 28, 2026, the average yearly pay for startup engineer in Virginia is $100,879.00, according to ZipRecruiter salary data. Most workers in this role earn between $83,300.00 and $115,500.00 per year, depending on experience, location, and employer.

What are some typical challenges a Startup Engineer faces when working in an early-stage company?

Startup Engineers often encounter rapidly changing priorities and ambiguous requirements as the company pivots to find product-market fit. They may need to balance building scalable solutions with the need for quick prototyping, sometimes working with limited resources or incomplete documentation. Collaboration across disciplines—such as product, design, and business teams—is frequent, so adaptability and strong communication skills are essential. These challenges can be demanding but also provide valuable opportunities to learn and grow quickly within a dynamic environment.

What are startup engineers?

Startup engineers are versatile software or hardware engineers who work at early-stage companies to design, build, and scale new products or technologies. They often wear many hats, handling everything from coding and infrastructure to product design and sometimes even customer feedback. Startup engineers thrive in fast-paced environments where adaptability, creativity, and problem-solving are essential. Their work is crucial in turning innovative ideas into viable products quickly, often with limited resources and tight deadlines.

What are the key skills and qualifications needed to thrive as a Startup Engineer, and why are they important?

To thrive as a Startup Engineer, you need strong programming abilities, a solid understanding of software architecture, and versatility across tech stacks, often supported by a degree in computer science or related fields. Familiarity with cloud platforms (like AWS or GCP), version control systems (such as Git), and rapid prototyping tools is commonly required. Adaptability, problem-solving, and effective communication are standout soft skills for this fast-paced environment. These skills and qualities are crucial for efficiently building scalable products and adapting to the evolving needs and constraints of early-stage startups.
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What cities in Virginia are hiring for Startup Engineer jobs? Cities in Virginia with the most Startup Engineer job openings:
Startup Engineer jobs near you
Infographic showing various Startup Engineer job openings in Virginia as of July 2026, with employment types broken down into 93% Full Time, 4% Part Time, and 3% Contract. Highlights an 89% Physical, 4% Hybrid, and 7% Remote job distribution, with an average salary of $100,879 per year, or $48.5 per hour.
Senior Software Test Engineer

Senior Software Test Engineer

Frontier Technology Inc.

Chesapeake, VA • On-site

$107K - $139K/yr

Full-time

Posted 4 days ago

Job description

We are a cutting-edge Defense Innovation Company seeking a Senior QA Engineer to join our engineering organization and raise the bar for quality across our web application portfolio. This is not a manual testing role — it is a hands-on, heavy coding position for an engineer who treats test automation as a software discipline. You will architect, build, and maintain automation frameworks with the same rigor applied to production code, with Playwright at the center of your toolkit.

You'll operate with the autonomy and pace of a startup engineer, backed by the scale and resources of an enterprise. The ideal candidate has thrived on small, fast-moving teams and knows how to deliver quality at speed without heavyweight process.

This role is ideally based near one of FTI's office locations in Chesapeake, VA, Beavercreek, OH, Colorado Springs, CO, or Northern Virginia. Candidates in these markets will receive primary consideration. Exceptional remote candidates with highly relevant experience may also be considered.


  • Design, develop, and maintain robust end-to-end automation suites for complex web application workflows using Playwright with TypeScript/JavaScript
  • Leverage frontier LLM models to increase development velocity and code quality
  • Architect scalable, maintainable test frameworks and shared libraries adopted across multiple engineering teams
  • Integrate automated testing into CI/CD pipelines to enable fast, confident, continuous delivery
  • Write production-quality code daily — page objects, fixtures, custom utilities, API test harnesses, and tooling
  • Partner with developers, product managers, and DevOps to shift quality left and embed testability into design and architecture decisions
  • Triage, root-cause, and drive resolution of defects and flaky tests; champion test reliability and meaningful coverage metrics
  • Mentor engineers on automation best practices and code review test code with a critical eye
  • Evaluate and introduce tools and practices that improve quality engineering velocity

Required Qualifications

  • Must be a U.S. Citizen AND possess an active U.S. Dept. of Defense Secret security clearance with TS/SCI eligibility.
  • Bachelor's degree in a STEM field (required)
  • 5+ years of software quality engineering or software development experience
  • Extensive, demonstrable experience using Playwright to automate workflows in modern web applications
  • Strong professional experience writing JavaScript/TypeScript — you will be evaluated as a coder
  • Experience working in startups or small, fast-moving teams where you owned outcomes end-to-end
  • Solid understanding of CI/CD practices and integrating automated tests into build pipelines (e.g., GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Jenkins, ADO)
  • Deep knowledge of testing strategy: E2E, API, integration, and component testing trade-offs
  • Strong debugging skills across the stack — browser internals, network traffic, async behavior, race conditions
  • Excellent communication skills and the ability to influence quality practices across teams

Preferred Qualifications

  • BS in Computer Science or a closely related field (greatly preferred)
  • MS in Computer Science (preferred)
  • Experience with cloud platforms — GCP, AWS, or Azure
  • Experience with API testing, contract testing, or performance/load testing
  • Familiarity with containerization (Docker, Kubernetes) and infrastructure-as-code
  • Prior experience with scaling test automation in a large engineering organization

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