OpenAI

Frontier AI Research Lab — Building Safe Artificial General Intelligence

The consensus on OpenAI: Choose OpenAI if you want to work at the frontier of AI with world-class colleagues and elite comp — but expect intense hours and rapid org changes.

2015
Founded
San Francisco
Headquarters
~3,500
Employees
$300B
Valuation (2025)
Culture Overview

What it's really like to work at OpenAI

Founded in 2015 by Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and others, OpenAI is the company behind GPT-4, ChatGPT, and DALL-E. The culture is intensely mission-driven with a focus on building safe AGI. Engineers work on cutting-edge research with massive compute budgets. Expect world-class colleagues, elite compensation, and an environment that moves at breakneck speed.

Engineering-Driven Ship Fast Learning Ethical AI Product Impact Strong Equity
Glassdoor Ratings

OpenAI Glassdoor Ratings & Employee Reviews

4.5
Overall Glassdoor Score
Based on 94 reviews
Culture & Values 4.3
Compensation & Benefits 4.8
Senior Management 3.5
Career Opportunities 4.1
Work-Life Balance 3.6
Overall Rating 4.5
82% Recommend to a Friend
~75% CEO Approval (Sam Altman)
Employee Review Themes

Working at OpenAI: Pros & Cons

✓ What employees love

  • ✓ Cutting-edge frontier AI research with world-class colleagues
  • ✓ Elite compensation — top-tier TC and equity packages
  • ✓ Massive compute budgets — resources to pursue ambitious research
  • ✓ Direct impact on products used by hundreds of millions
  • ✓ Incredible learning environment — surrounded by the best in AI

✗ What could be better

  • ✗ High-intensity environment — long hours and intense pace are the norm
  • ✗ Internal politics and rapid org changes as the company scales
  • ✗ Management quality varies — some teams lack clear direction
  • ✗ Work-life balance is poor — 3.6/5 rating reflects real burnout risk
Engineering Culture

How the engineering team works

Tech Stack

Python PyTorch Kubernetes Rust C++

Open Source & Research

Created GPT models, Whisper, CLIP, and Triton. Active open-source contributor despite some research being proprietary.

Engineering Blog

Publishes research papers on arxiv and maintains an active research blog covering scaling laws, alignment, and safety. Read the research →

Team Structure

Research-lab meets product org. Small, autonomous teams with high ownership. Engineers are expected to be self-directed and ship rapidly.

Open Positions

Join the OpenAI team

Explore featured roles below, or browse all 617 open positions on the full jobs board.

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