---
title: 'Backend/PHP Engineer at Airalo'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/backend-php-engineer-airalo-united-kingdom-289z9nq6bbz5'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-09-10'
---

# Backend/PHP Engineer at Airalo

- **Company:** Airalo
- **Location:** United Kingdom
- **Compensation:** £75k–£108k
- **Employment:** full-time
- **Work type:** remote
- **Posted:** 2026-08-20
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-10
- **Apply:** https://jobs.lever.co/airalo/39338d13-5f26-4c0b-86af-f829b6bf8ef2

## Job description

Help Us Build The Future of Travel At Airalo, we're making it easier for people to stay connected wherever they travel. As the world's first eSIM store, we help millions of travelers access affordable mobile data in 200+ countries and regions around the world. Today, we're a team of 400+ people across 60+ countries, building a product used by travelers every day. We've grown quickly, but we've worked hard to keep what matters: trust, ownership, and the freedom for people to do great work without unnecessary layers or bureaucracy. We're fully remote by design, genuinely global, and united by a shared mission to make travel simpler for everyone.

## Your Next Destination

Location: Remote, anywhere in Spain or the UK. Contract: Spain: Full-time, permanent contrato indefinido via Deel (our employer of record in Spain) UK: Full-time, permanent Benefits: Learn more about our benefits here in this link - https://airalo-public.notion.site/Benefits-25396a97ffca81fb9bc1f0be479f1be3?pvs=74 Languages: English is our main working language day to day, so you'll need to be comfortable communicating in it both in meetings and async. Curious what it's actually like to work at Airalo? We've put together a guide for each of the hubs we hire from most, covering our benefits, remote culture, employment setup, and what our team values most: Life at Airalo · España: https://airalo-public.notion.site/life-at-airalo-espana Life at Airalo · United Kingdom: https://airalo-public.notion.site/life-at-airalo-united-kingdom

Are you a passionate backend engineer who thrives on solving complex architectural puzzles in PHP? Join our team as a Backend Engineer where you will lead the evolution of our global platform with more then 30 million users. We value technical mastery and the ability to balance rapid innovation with system stability. While we use Laravel, we highly value the architectural rigor of seasoned Symfony experts ready to pick up Laravel and apply their skills to our ecosystem.

Your main responsibilities are:

- Develop and maintain robust backend services capable of handling high-volume global traffic.
- Implement functional APIs and optimize query performance to ensure a seamless user experience.
- Contribute to our modular architecture, helping us build resilient, service-oriented systems.
- Write clean, maintainable code by applying SOLID principles, OOP best practices, and design patterns.
- Master the art of debugging, identifying and resolving issues across our stack with precision.
- Integrate asynchronous processes using queues and basic event-driven patterns to improve system efficiency.
- Collaborate closely with Senior Engineers and Product teams to turn requirements into high-quality technical solutions.

Does this sound like you:

- 3-5 years of professional backend development experience with a solid command of PHP.
- Proven experience building applications in Laravel or a strong background in Symfony with a desire to transition.
- Strong understanding of OOP, interfaces, and code modularity; you know why "clean code" matters.
- Solid knowledge of SQL, including database indexing, migrations, and basic query optimization.
- AI Proficiency: Ability to effectively use AI tools during technical tasks; we value engineers who know how to prompt, validate, and iterate with AI to build better software faster.
- Familiarity with modern infrastructure, including Docker and basic CI/CD pipeline troubleshooting.
- Experience with testing, specifically writing unit and feature tests to ensure code reliability.
- Fluent English with the ability to communicate technical progress and seek support effectively within a remote team.

Bonus:

- Familiarity with caching mechanisms (Redis/Memcached) and Cloud services (AWS).
- Experience with SaaS or Traveltech solutions.
- Experience with eSIM or GSMA technologies.
- A curiosity for distributed systems and horizontal scaling.

Please be aware that we can only consider candidates for this role who already reside and are fully eligible to work in the UK.

If you are interested in this position, please apply via the link.

## Why People Join Us

🇪🇸 Why people join us in Spain We started Airalo to make staying connected effortless, wherever you are in the world. Today, millions of travelers rely on our eSIMs, and many of the people building the product were customers first. Our team is united by a shared belief that great work happens when people are trusted to own what they do. As Airalo continues to grow, so do the opportunities to learn, take on new challenges, and make a real impact. For many of our teammates in Spain, it's the combination of stability, flexibility, and genuine work-life balance that makes Airalo feel like home. 🇬🇧 Why people join us in the UK We started Airalo to make staying connected effortless, wherever you are in the world. Today, millions of travelers rely on our eSIMs, and many of the people building the product first discovered us as customers. Our team spans 60+ countries, but what people often notice quickly is how work actually feels here. There's trust to own what you do, space to focus without constant layers of process, and a clear sense of what you're responsible for from day one. As Airalo continues to grow, people tend to stay for a mix of things: the chance to work on a product used globally, the autonomy to shape how they work, and the opportunity to keep taking on new challenges without getting stuck in one lane. On-Call Participating in our on-call rotation is a core expectation of this role. It's essential for maintaining 24/7 service reliability across our global operations, ensuring our systems remain resilient and our customers experience uninterrupted service, regardless of time zone or geography. Paid Rotation: We offer standby fees + overtime pay. Delayed Start: No on-call duties for your first 6 months. Rest & Recovery: Guaranteed rest periods and flexible hours following night incidents. Shared Load: Rotations are split (Weekdays vs. Weekends) to minimize fatigue. Please refer to the On-Call Policy in the Airalo Handbook for full details: https://airalo-public.notion.site/our-approach-to-engineering-on-call-policy Before You Hit Apply By applying, you acknowledge and agree that, in case of successful application, Airalo may request to run background checks as a condition for entering into an agreement with you. Rest assured that these checks will only occur upon your prior consent and at the end of the selection process, and will be strictly limited to what is allowed under the laws that are applicable to you. All data that you share or that we collect in connection with such checks will be processed in accordance with our Privacy Policy, available here: www.airalo.com/more-info/privacy-policy?srsltid=AfmBOooBT0rXAj1FaNelZ3VfN0wvhwzvAoxdtHnOKSVETpiSjiXVuycy

We sincerely thank all applicants in advance for submitting their interest in this opportunity. Airalo is an equal-opportunity employer and values diversity, equity & inclusion. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status. We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations upon request for individuals with disabilities throughout our job interview process.

## About Airalo

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: Airalo is the world's first eSIM store, providing travelers with digital SIM cards for flexible, affordable data coverage in over 200 countries and regions.
- **Entity Type**: Private (Series C)
- **Headquarters**: Delaware, United States (legal HQ; global presence includes Singapore and Türkiye)
- **Founded**: 2019
- **Founders**: Ahmet Bahadir Ozdemir, Abraham Burak, Duran Akcaylier

## Core Business
- **Primary industry**: Telecommunications / Travel connectivity (consumer eSIMs and B2B eSIM distribution)
- **Target customers**: Consumer travelers needing international data; B2B partners (travel brands, resellers, apps) via the partner platform
- **Mission**: "To provide global data connectivity for all people" — liberating users from roaming limits and helping everyone connect from anywhere

## Products & Services
- **Airalo eSIM Store / Mobile App**: The core product — local, regional, and global eSIMs for iPhone, iPad, and Android devices, with coverage in 200+ countries and regions. Bought digitally and activated on-device, eliminating physical SIM swaps.
- **Partners Platform (partners.airalo.com)**: B2B offering for travel companies, apps, and resellers to integrate or resell Airalo eSIMs (API/white-label distribution channel).

## Market Standing
- **Valuation/Market Cap**: Not disclosed (private)
- **Key Metric**: Total funding of USD 287.4M across 6 rounds — including USD 220M Series C (August 2025, led by CVC Capital Partners), USD 60M Series B (July 2023), and USD 5.4M Series A (October 2021, led by Rakuten Ventures)
- **Annual Revenue**: USD 9.5M per LinkedIn company data (likely an estimate; not officially disclosed)
- **Notable Investors/Partners**: CVC Capital Partners (lead, Series C), Rakuten Ventures (lead, Series A), plus a broad syndicate of 14+ investors across rounds
- **Growth Signals**:
  - 30M+ users worldwide (company-reported)
  - Coverage in 200+ countries and regions
  - Headcount grew to 319 employees, up +24.6% YoY (+77 people)
  - Truly global footprint: workforce distributed across 52 countries (LinkedIn) / 60+ countries and 6 continents (company site)
  - Active hiring across Engineering, Marketing, Finance, and Strategy roles

## Competitive Advantages
- **First-mover position** as the world's first eSIM store, establishing brand leadership in the consumer travel connectivity category
- **Broad global coverage** (200+ destinations) creates strong negotiating leverage with network operators and gives travelers a one-stop solution
- **Large user base (30M+)** generates data, brand trust, and network effects that are hard for later entrants to replicate
- **Remote-first global organization** spanning 60+ countries — enables 24/7 support, localized market knowledge, and low geographic hiring constraints

## Strategic Focus
- Expanding global connectivity coverage and deepening operator partnerships
- Growing the B2B partner channel (partners.airalo.com) to embed eSIMs in other travel products
- Continuing social impact initiatives (Clean Water Initiative in Cameroon, Children International sponsorships, relief funds for Ukraine, Myanmar, and Australia)
- Post-Series C scaling of product, network infrastructure, and go-to-market functions

## Why Work Here
- **Remote-first culture**: Team is spread across 60+ countries and six continents; annual in-person connection is built in
- **Airalo Away**: Annual all-expenses-paid retreat (4 nights, 5 days) in a host country, focused on team bonding and wellness
- **Benefits include**: Tools and technology supply, remote-work stipend, yearly wellness credit, comprehensive healthcare package, annual Airmoney budget for personal eSIM use (plus family), USD 500 annual training budget with additional training days added as extra annual leave
- **Culture**: Emphasizes diversity, inclusion, and equity as a core part of a global, multi-continent organization
- **Employer rating**: 4.1/5.0 on LinkedIn (61 reviews), with Compensation 4.2, Work-Life 4.2, Culture 4.1, Career 4.0
- **Interview process**: Applications acknowledged within one week; multi-stage interviews emphasizing curiosity and mutual fit

## Sources
1. [airalo.com](https://www.airalo.com/about-us/about-airalo/)
2. [airalo.com](https://www.airalo.com/airalo-careers/working-at-airalo)
3. [airalo.com](https://www.airalo.com/airalo-careers/job-vacancies)
4. [linkedin.com](https://www.linkedin.com/company/airalocom)
5. [lever.co](https://jobs.lever.co/airalo)

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