Senior Developer Educator/Technical Writer in London

Our everyday digital experiences are in the midst of a realtime revolution. Whether chatting alongside a livestreaming event, receiving realtime financial information, or working with colleagues in an online collaborative environment - consumers simply expect realtime digital experiences as standard. At Ably we're not just witnessing this revolution, we're powering it - at scale.

At the heart of our mission lies a commitment to putting developers first. Ably provides a suite of products to build, extend, and deliver powerful digital experiences in realtime, delivering billions of messages for millions of devices every day and supporting organizations like Harness, EA, Panasonic and HubSpot.

Working at Ably means helping to build the infrastructure and technology that will power and shape the future of the internet. The opportunity in front of us is immense. And we'd like your help.

About this role: Thousands of developers around the world use Ably's SDKs and APIs to power realtime features in their applications. The Developer Education team helps those developers understand Ably, build confidently and succeed in production.

As a Developer Educator, you'll create high-quality technical content that serves the needs of a deeply technical audience, while thinking broadly about the developer experience. This is a hands-on, individual contributor role where you'll collaborate closely with engineering and product teams and raise the bar for developer-facing content.

Day to day you will:

• Educate and provide instruction. You'll break down complex topics by writing clear, concise and intuitive explanations of Ably's technology features, and APIs.
• Produce engaging educational content. You'll create and maintain documentation, guides, example projects, onboarding materials and code samples. You'll also help shape new formats that improve developer learning and drive adoption.
• Write and reason about code. You'll create, review, and improve code samples, ensuring they are accurate, idiomatic, and easy for developers to understand and reuse.
• Improve developer experience and onboarding. You'll remove friction from developer journeys, making it faster and easier for our users to succeed with Ably. You'll act as an advocate for their perspectives, providing insights that shape better outcomes.
• Develop a strong understanding of Ably. You'll build a broad understanding of Ably's platform, products and use cases, supported by an experienced Developer Education team that collaborates closely and shares knowledge.

We'd love to talk if you have:

• Proven success creating technical content for developers, such as documentation, API references and guides.
• Familiarity with APIs, SDKs, and modern web development tools, with the ability to read, write and reason about code examples in at least one programming language (ideally JavaScript).
• Strong instincts for developer experience and a genuine desire to produce amazing developer experiences.
• A proactive, self-directed mindset with the ability to take ownership of tasks from ideation through to completion.
• The drive to consistently leave everything you touch better than it was before.
• Experience using AI tools as a core part of your workflow for writing, research, and coding - whilst ensuring the content adheres to editorial standards and is technically accurate.
• Experience at a startup or growth-stage company, or adaptability to thrive in a fast-paced, agile environment with a focus on rapid iteration.

To be effective in this role you'll need excellent communication and cross-functional collaboration skills.

Bonus points if you have:

• Experience improving developer onboarding flows or journeys.
• Familiarity with git-driven workflows for managing changes.
• Some knowledge/understanding of event-driven architecture.

What’s it like to work at Ably? We’re tackling planet-scale problems and our ambitions are a testament to that. You’ll join a successful, deeply motivated and collaborative team that thrives on innovation, experimentation and autonomy. To get a sense of life at Ably, visit our careers page. You can also read about the origins of Ably’s core values on our blog.

We believe in fostering a culture that’s built on inclusivity and mutual respect among all team members, and we recognise that each individual is different and will want to be supported in their role in different ways. We provide a range of perks and benefits to aid folks’ development and wellbeing, allowing them to be their best selves and do great work.

• A remote-first and flexible work environment. UK-based teams come together in person once per month in our London hub (next to Old Street) and we get together as a company twice per year. Aside from that, you’re welcome to work wherever suits best for you.
• Equity. We’re a growing start-up and we want all team members to share in the success of the company through our EMI share options programme.
• Enhanced holiday allowance. Our policy provides Ablyans with 28 days of paid annual leave (27 regular days, plus a day off to enjoy your birthday).
• Enhanced parental leave package, so that you can take the time you need to get to know your new family member, rest and recover.
• Home workstation budget of £500 on joining (and £150 p/a thereafter), so that your home office is set up to serve you well and that you have everything you need to work comfortably.
• Personal learning and development budget of £1000 annually, and 5% L&D time during working hours to focus on improving your skillset.
• Private healthcare with BUPA.
• Medical cash plan to cover a range of medical and dental costs.
• Mental wellbeing coaching and counselling from Self Space.
• Monthly wellbeing budget via Juno.
• Life assurance and income protection.
• Access to Tech & Cycle to Work schemes.
• Weekly snack allowance for our end-of-week "Need To Know" meeting.
• A fully-paid one-month sabbatical after five years with Ably.

Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging at Ably: We believe our differences as individuals is what makes us great. Our people are at the heart of what we do, and we encourage everyone to be their most authentic self at Ably: we see inclusivity and openness as fundamental to creating long-term success as an organization. We encourage applications from all backgrounds regardless of age, disability, gender, sexual orientation, parental status, race, religion, educational background or neurodiversity. Ably has an amazing opportunity ahead of us, and we want anyone to be able to contribute to that opportunity.

If you enjoy working as part of a technology company, value open source, and love solving hard problems - then we’d love to hear from you, regardless of whether you fit the job description exactly or not. If in doubt, drop us an email; we’d be more than happy to give you some advice on your application.