# Senior Machine Learning Engineer, Drive Source: https://realanalystjobs.com/job/senior-machine-learning-engineer-drive-doordash-21d15ee8 Senior Machine Learning Engineer, Drive at DoorDash, an on-site role based in San Francisco, California, USA. Experience level: 5+ Years. Posted on 13 October 2026, read from DoorDash's own careers page (Greenhouse), which RealAnalystJobs re-checks daily and removes the role when it closes. DoorDash has approved H-1B petitions on USCIS record (employer-wide, not a promise for this role). Updated 15 November 2026. ## Key facts - Company: [DoorDash](https://realanalystjobs.com/companies/doordash) - Location: San Francisco, California, USA - Work mode: On-site - Posted: Oct 13, 2026 - Employment type: Full time - Experience level: 5+ Years - Source: DoorDash's careers page (Greenhouse), re-checked daily Skills: [Python](https://realanalystjobs.com/skills/python), Spark, Airflow ## Visa sponsorship The posting does not say. DoorDash had H-1B petitions approved for 413 workers in fiscal year 2026 (USCIS). That is history, not a promise for this role. [See the record](https://realanalystjobs.com/companies/doordash#h1b-record) ## About this role About the Team DoorDash Drive powers deliveries placed through merchants' own channels - including their websites, mobile apps, and phone orders - using DoorDash's logistics network. The Drive Machine Learning team builds the prediction and intelligence systems that power this business, including delivery and pickup time estimation, merchant prep-time prediction, order release optimization, logistics decision-making, and AI-powered delivery quality signals. Drive presents a unique machine learning challenge. Every merchant has different operational workflows, preparation patterns, and customer expectations, requiring models that generalize across millions of deliveries while adapting to highly diverse merchant behavior. Our team has significant opportunities to improve prediction accuracy, optimize logistics decisions, and build AI-native experiences that directly improve merchant, consumer, and dasher outcomes. About the Role As a Machine Learning Engineer on the Drive team, you'll own machine learning systems end-to-end - from feature engineering and model development to experimentation, deployment, monitoring, and continuous iteration. Your work will span several high-impact problem areas: • Build next-generation machine learning models for delivery ETA, pickup ETA, merchant prep-time estimation, and order release prediction that improve reliability for merchants and consumers. • Develop deep learning models that leverage large-scale spatiotemporal, marketplace, and behavioral signals to improve prediction accuracy. • Apply reinforcement learning and optimization techniques to improve logistics decision-making, assignment strategies, and marketplace efficiency. • Build AI-native product experiences using large language models (LLMs) and vision-language models (VLMs). For example, transform pickup photos, item verification flows, receipts, and drop-off images into structured quality signals that help verify orders, prevent delivery defects, and improve issue resolution. • Design and run rigorous online experiments, production monitoring, and model iteration to continuously improve performance. • Partner closely with software engineers, product managers, data scientists, and platform teams to bring new machine learning capabilities into production at scale. • You'll have the opportunity to work across traditional machine learning, deep learning, reinforcement learning, optimization, and multimodal AI while solving some of the most challenging logistics problems at DoorDash. You're excited about this opportunity because... • You enjoy solving large-scale machine learning problems that directly impact millions of deliveries. • You have a strong sense of ownership and enjoy taking models from research through production. • You're comfortable working in ambiguous environments where experimentation and iteration drive product decisions. • You care about both model quality and production reliability. • You're excited to work across a diverse set of ML techniques - from neural networks and optimization to multimodal AI. • You collaborate well across engineering, product, and data science teams. We’re excited about you because… • 5+ years of industry experience building and shipping production machine learning systems with measurable business impact (Bachelor's, Master's, or PhD). • Strong experience developing production machine learning models using modern deep learning frameworks such as PyTorch and distributed data processing technologies such as Spark and Airflow. • Experience building, deploying, monitoring, and maintaining production ML systems end-to-end. • Strong software engineering skills in Python and experience with modern ML infrastructure and tooling. • Deep expertise in at least one of the following areas: • Deep Learning • Reinforcement Learning • Optimization / Operations Research • Large Language Models (LLMs) or Vision-Language Models (VLMs) • Experience applying machine learning to estimation, ranking, prediction, optimization, or decision-making problems at production scale. • Hands-on experience with LLMs or VLMs is a strong plus. • Experience in logistics, marketplaces, or delivery platforms is helpful but not required. • Proficiency using AI-assisted development tools (e.g. Claude Code, Codex, Cursor) throughout the software development lifecycle. • You are located or are planning to relocate to San Francisco, CA, Sunnyvale, CA, or Seattle, WA. Compensation The successful candidate's starting pay will fall within the pay range listed below and is determined based on job-related factors including, but not limited to, skills, experience, qualifications, work location, and market conditions. Base salary is localized according to an employee’s work location. Ranges are market-dependent and may be modified in the future. In addition to base salary, the compensation for this role includes opportunities for equity grants. Talk to your recruiter for more information. DoorDash cares about you and your overall well-being. That’s why we offer a comprehensive benefits package to all regular employees, which includes a 401(k) plan with employer matching, 16 weeks of paid parental leave, wellness benefits, commuter benefits match, paid time off and paid sick leave in compliance with applicable laws (e.g. Colorado Healthy Families and Workplaces Act). DoorDash also offers medical, dental, and vision benefits, 11 paid holidays, disability and basic life insurance, family-forming assistance, and a mental health program, among others. To learn more about our benefits, visit our careers page here . See below for paid time off details: • For salaried roles: flexible paid time off/vacation, plus 80 hours of paid sick time per year. • For hourly roles: vacation accrued at about 1 hour for every 25.97 hours worked (e.g. about 6.7 hours/month if working 40 hours/week; about 3.4 hours/month if working 20 hours/week), and paid sick time accrued at 1 hour for every Description from DoorDash's public careers feed, reproduced so you can read the role here. Apply on the company's own site; Real Analyst Jobs never submits anything for you. ## How to apply Open [this role on Real Analyst Jobs](https://realanalystjobs.com/job/senior-machine-learning-engineer-drive-doordash-21d15ee8) and use Apply now there to reach the employer's application. The listing is re-checked against DoorDash's careers page daily and removed when it closes. ## DoorDash 1 open analyst role on Real Analyst Jobs. [More roles at DoorDash](https://realanalystjobs.com/companies/doordash) ## More like this ### Other open roles at DoorDash - [Director, Analytics, DashOS](https://realanalystjobs.com/job/director-analytics-dashos-doordash-a94955b9), New York New York, USA (On-site) - [Data analyst jobs in the USA](https://realanalystjobs.com/jobs/data-analyst-jobs-in-usa) - [Analyst job market report](https://realanalystjobs.com/analyst-job-market) - [What analyst roles pay](https://realanalystjobs.com/blog/data-analyst-salaries) ## Sources and links - [This role on Real Analyst Jobs](https://realanalystjobs.com/job/senior-machine-learning-engineer-drive-doordash-21d15ee8) - [DoorDash on Real Analyst Jobs](https://realanalystjobs.com/companies/doordash) - [All analyst jobs](https://realanalystjobs.com/jobs)