aimlroles

Research Engineer / Research Scientist - Personal AGI, Memory

OpenAI openai.com Open · verified Oct 22, 2026
San Francisco Full-time Mid-level AI Research

At a glance

Mid-level AI Research role at OpenAI. San Francisco · full-time · $380,000–$500,000 base.

SalaryStated by OpenAI
$380,000 – $500,000
Base salary for this role, in USD per year, as published in the posting.
This role, from OpenAIOur estimate for the market: $200,000–$266,875Median $240,000
Above the market median of $240,000 for mid-level AI research roles in San Francisco.
Worked out from 50 postings that stated pay, median $240,000. Last updated Oct 22, 2026.
RoleAI Research
SeniorityMid-level
LocationSan Francisco
EmploymentFull-time
Base pay$380,000–$500,000
PostedAug 3, 2026 · 2mo ago
Role brief

aimlroles summary, based on the employer's posting.

What you'll do

  • Set a research direction for improving how frontier models retain information and personalize responses over long interactions
  • Create evaluations that show whether modeling changes improve performance
  • Write, test, and troubleshoot code throughout the research stack
  • Work with research and product teams to shape technical choices for product features

What you bring

  • A background in reinforcement learning research
  • The ability to work within a large machine-learning codebase and debug issues

Who this fits

This role suits a researcher or engineer focused on reinforcement learning, memory, and long-horizon tasks who wants research to reach products. The job is based in San Francisco, with three office days each week; relocation assistance is available for new hires.

From the employer

About the Team

The Personalization-Memory team, within OpenAI's broader Personal AGI organization, is focused on developing agents that can learn from prior interactions in order to become more helpful and efficient over time. We build general-purpose memory and personalization capabilities that transfer across ChatGPT and other agentic products, and we collaborate with applied engineering on the product surfaces that allow users to interact with memory.

About the Role

As a Research Engineer / Research Scientist on the Personalization-Memory team, your work will span memory architecture, post-training, and developing long-horizon tasks for training and evaluations.

We're looking for individuals who have a background in reinforcement learning research, are able to iterate quickly, and who can convert scientific rigor and long-term research into realized product impact.

This role is based in San Francisco, CA. We use a hybrid work model of 3 days in the office per week and offer relocation assistance to new employees.

In this role, you will:

  • Own and pursue a research agenda for improving long-horizon memory and personalization in frontier models.

  • Build robust evaluations for tracking modeling improvements.

  • Design, implement, test, and debug code across our research stack.

  • Collaborate closely with the research and product teams to influence the shape of technical solutions in the product.

You might thrive in this role if you:

  • Love being on the cutting edge of RL and frontier model research.

  • Value principled approaches and research craftsmanship.

  • Are passionate about long-horizon tasks, memory, and turning your research into product impact.

  • Are comfortable diving into a large ML codebase to debug.

  • Thrive in a fast-paced, dynamic, and technically complex environment.

About OpenAI

OpenAI is an AI research and deployment company dedicated to ensuring that general-purpose artificial intelligence benefits all of humanity. We push the boundaries of the capabilities of AI systems and seek to safely deploy them to the world through our products. AI is an extremely powerful tool that must be created with safety and human needs at its core, and to achieve our mission, we must encompass and value the many different perspectives, voices, and experiences that form the full spectrum of humanity.

We are an equal opportunity employer, and we do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, veteran status, disability, genetic information, or other applicable legally protected characteristic.

For additional information, please see OpenAI’s Affirmative Action and Equal Employment Opportunity Policy Statement.

Background checks for applicants will be administered in accordance with applicable law, and qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment consistent with those laws, including the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers, and the California Fair Chance Act, for US-based candidates. For unincorporated Los Angeles County workers: we reasonably believe that criminal history may have a direct, adverse and negative relationship with the following job duties, potentially resulting in the withdrawal of a conditional offer of employment: protect computer hardware entrusted to you from theft, loss or damage; return all computer hardware in your possession (including the data contained therein) upon termination of employment or end of assignment; and maintain the confidentiality of proprietary, confidential, and non-public information. In addition, job duties require access to secure and protected information technology systems and related data security obligations.

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