Principal Design Engineer, Interactive Graphics, Copilot

About AIxDesign & Research

If you're curious, creative, and excited by how AI is reshaping the practice of design, we'd love to work with you! The AI Experiences Design & Research team is a community of designers, researchers, and makers reimagining how people interact with technology. We design across Microsoft's AI-powered experiences, including Copilot, Edge, Bing, MSN, and emerging products, creating end-to-end journeys that span devices, platforms, and contexts. We're looking for people who embrace experimentation, use new tools to expand what's possible, and aren't afraid to move beyond traditional design boundaries. Together, we're building experiences that make AI more useful, intuitive, and delightful for billions of people around the world. Join us as we reimagine not only the products people use, but the future of design itself!

The opportunity

We’re looking for a hands-on design engineer who thinks like an artist and builds for the browser. On the Copilot Design team at Microsoft, you’ll originate a distinctive visual point of view and turn it into expressive, useful interactive experiences. Composition, typography, light, material, timing and physical behavior are part of your design vocabulary; JavaScript, shaders and real-time rendering are part of your medium.

This is a specialist role for someone who can invent the experience and code it, not only implement a finished design. You’ll work across artistic exploration and production engineering, balancing surprise and delight with clarity, accessibility and responsiveness. The work asks for both ambition and restraint: know when motion makes an interaction more understandable, and when a quieter experience serves people better.

Responsibilities

• Conceive, sketch in codeand refine distinctive interactive experiences. Make artistic decisions about composition, typography, light, material, rhythmand physical behavior, then test how those choices work in a real interface.

• Create code-driven motion, custom shaders and procedural or generative visuals that respond to user input and product state. Design coherent transitions and behaviors, not just isolated effects.

• Explore useful assistant interactions such as activity and progress, transitions, interruptionand feedback. These are illustrative opportunities to investigate, not a commitment to a particular product roadmap.

• Develop production-ready components and partner with product engineering on integration, testingand maintenance. Carry the visual intent through implementation, including state changes, edge casesand graceful degradation.

• Turn successful explorations into reusable motion and graphics primitives, componentsand tools. Document the artistic and technical choices so other designers and engineers can extend the work without losing its character.

• Profile CPU and GPU work, frame time, memory, loadingand input responsiveness. Build accessible, reduced-motionand non-GPU alternatives, and validatebehavior across browsers, devices and different levelsof graphics capability.

• Set a high creative and technical craft bar while staying hands-on. Mentor through critique and code review, explain trade-offs clearly and help partners choose purposeful expression over unnecessary spectacle.

Qualifications

Skills & experience

We value demonstrated craft and ownership, whether developed through professional roles, independent practice, open-source work or self-directed learning. Equivalent practical experience and nontraditional paths are welcome. The specialist capabilities below matter more than having used every tool in a particular stack.

Required skills:

• Master's Degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Graphic Design, Product Design, Visual Design, Human Computer Interaction, or related field AND 4+ years experience working in product or service design and/or shipping production code
  • OR Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Graphic Design, Product Design, Visual Design, Human Computer Interaction, or related field AND 6+ years experience working in product or service design and/or shipping production code
  • OR 8+ years experience working in product or service design and/or shipping production code
  • OR equivalent experience.

Preferred Skills & Experience:

• A portfolio showing original artistic direction and the ability to originate, develop and iterate visual ideas in code. You can explain why your choices in composition, typography, light, materialand motion serve the experience.

• Strong hands-on coded motion and interaction design, including timing, easing, sequencing, springor physics-based behavior, and responsive or interruptible transitions. Motion is a core craft, not a finishing layer.

• Hands-on real-time browser graphics using WebGL or WebGPU, including writing and adapting custom shaders. You understand rendering fundamentals well enough to shape the result, debug it and explain the trade-offs; GLSL or WGSL are examples of relevant shader languages.

• Strong JavaScript/TypeScript and contemporary browser engineering skills, including componentarchitecture, asynchronous state, input handling, responsive interfacesand code review. You can integrate a graphics experience into a maintained product, not only a standalone demo.

• Experience profiling and improving browser rendering, loading, memoryand input responsiveness. You can preserve visual intent while meeting accessibility needs, honoring reduced motionand providing reliable non-GPU paths across browsers and devices.

• Demonstrated ownership of ambiguous work from creative direction through delivery, with clear communication and effective design-engineering partnership. Youwelcome critique, make sound trade-offsand help others raise their artistic and technical craft.

• Libraries are flexible. Three.js, React Three Fiber, GSAP and Motion are examples of useful tools, not a checklist. We care about the ideas you originate, your depth in motion and real-time graphics, and the quality of the browser experience you deliver.
• Deeper WebGPU, compute or GPU profiling experience, including rendering pipelines, simulationsor techniques for efficient procedural and generative graphics.
• Experience building reusable motion or graphics systems, authoring toolsor creative workflows that other people adopt and can maintain.
• Experience designing forAI or assistant experiences, especiallymaking complex or changing states understandable. An AI-specific background is welcome, not required.
• A practice of sharing craft through thoughtful technical writing, creative coding experiments, open-source contributions, teachingor mentorship.

UX Engineering IC5 - The typical base pay range for this role across the U.S. is USD $142,800 - $274,800 per year. There is a different range applicable to specific work locations, within the San Francisco Bay area and New York City metropolitan area, and the base pay range for this role in those locations is USD $188,000 - $304,200 per year.

Certain roles may be eligible for benefits and other compensation. Find additional benefits and pay information here:

https://careers.microsoft.com/us/en/us-corporate-pay

This position will be open for a minimum of 5 days, with applications accepted on an ongoing basis until the position is filled.

Microsoft is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, citizenship, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, immigration status, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran or military status, race, ethnicity, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable local laws, regulations and ordinances. If you need assistance with religious accommodations and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application process, read more about requesting accommodations.