Senior Narrative Designer

Duolingo

New York City, USonsite$134k-$181k/yrPosted Apr 23, 2026
Posting intelligenceListed a while

At a glance

Highlights

  • mission-driven education impact
  • collaborate with product and engineering
  • creative character experience design

Why this role might suit you

The role offers the chance to shape character-driven experiences across diverse subjects, collaborate with cross-functional teams, and work on a mission-focused product used by hundreds of millions of learners, with competitive compensation and equity.

Skills

dialogue-writingcharacter-designnarrative-system-designinteractive-productsgame-designscriptwriting

About the role

Our mission at Duolingo is to develop the best education in the world and make it universally available. It’s a big mission, and even though we've made a lot of headway, we still have work to do — and that’s where you come in!

Duolingo’s designers care about creating high-quality experiences that look and feel fun. From animators to writers, product designers to researchers, Design brings purpose, feeling, and delight to every interaction with our brand, inside the app and out. As a designer, you’ll join a culture of creativity and craft, where we have a high bar for excellence and an endless curiosity about how to bring more unexpected quirk and fun to the pursuit of learning.

Join us in our mission to develop education for our half a billion (and growing!) learners around the world.

About the role...

We’re looking for a Narrative Designer to add delight and depth to our characters by shaping how they behave and show up across new learning experiences beyond Language—like Math, Music, and more.

🧠 You will...

Own and evolve a character experience within a New Subjects area (e.g., Math, Music)

Write dialog and UI strings that capture our characters’ established style and tone

Integrate character personality into lessons and core product moments

Shape how characters behave across surfaces, balancing systems that guide their performance

Partner with Product, Design, and Engineering to define and iterate on character-driven features

✅ You have...

Excellent creative writing skills and expertise in crafting character-rich dialog

Strong ability to mine the zeitgeist for themes (and memes!) to keep content fresh and fun

Deep experience collaborating with engineering, art, and product management partners

Experience working on interactive products or systems (not just linear content)

⭐ Exceptional candidates will have...

Game design experience, especially a deep understanding of narrative system design

We post a multi-level salary range for all of our roles.

This is not inclusive of the rest of our awesome portfolio that includes equity compensation and world-class benefits. Our salary ranges are the same for all US locations. Your recruiter can share more details about the range for a specific level during the hiring process. The actual salary within the range is determined by many factors including but not limited to, skills, experience, education, and internal equity.

Salary Range:

$133,500—$180,600 USD

Take a peek at how we care for our employees' holistic well-being with our benefits here.

We will do everything we can within reason to make sure that your interview takes place in an environment that fairly and accurately assesses your skills. If you need assistance or accommodation, please contact accommodations@duolingo.com.

By applying for this position your data will be processed as per the Duolingo Applicant Privacy Notice.

Unfortunately, there is a rise in scammers pretending to be real Duolingo employees. Duolingo and our employees will never ask for your Social Security number, bank details, or passport info, and we’ll never ask you to deposit a check, purchase equipment, or exchange money during the interview process. Real Duolingo employees always use an email that ends in @duolingo.com or @recruiting.duolingo.com. Stay alert and double-check these details before sharing any information.

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Compensation

This Game Designer role pays $134k-$181k/yr. Within typical range for game designer roles in United States.

Questions about this role

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