PhD Intern, AI Applied Research (2027) (AI)

Location: Based in Figma's San Francisco or New York hub offices; in-person onboarding required

Hourly base pay: $74 USD per hour. Housing stipend and travel reimbursement are also offered.

Company

Figma develops a collaborative design platform for brainstorming, prototyping, design-to-code workflows, and AI-powered product development.

What you will do

• Conduct fundamental and applied research in generative AI for Figma product use cases.
• Formulate and implement modeling approaches to improve existing AI models and enable new AI-powered features.
• Explore current technology limits and experiment with novel ideas in AI and design.
• Develop robust evaluators for design quality and end-user experience.
• Potentially publish research at leading AI and machine learning conferences.

Requirements

• 4th- or 5th-year PhD student in AI, machine learning, computer vision, natural language processing, human-computer interaction, or a related field.
• Publications or demonstrated expertise in recent AI advances, including large language models or agentic systems.
• Experience applying machine learning techniques in academic or industry projects.
• Experience with Python and machine learning frameworks such as PyTorch or TensorFlow.
• Ability to solve sophisticated problems and evaluate trade-offs between alternative approaches.

Nice to have

• Previous industry experience through an internship or full-time role.
• Experience communicating technical solutions to different audiences.
• Experience using AI-assisted development tools such as GitHub Copilot, ChatGPT, or Claude.

Culture & Benefits

• Collaborative, close-knit, and impact-focused AI Research team.
• Internship available in Winter 2027 or Summer 2027.
• Housing stipend and travel reimbursement.
• Reasonable accommodations are available throughout the application, interview, and employment process.

Hiring process

• Video interviews require candidates to keep their cameras on.
• In-person onboarding is required if hired.