Senior Quality Engineer (São Paulo)

Remote — São Paulo, Brazil candidates only.

About LawnStarter
We're the largest on-demand marketplace for lawn care and outdoor home services in the country — over $100 million in bookings annually and still climbing. But lawn care is just where we started. The actual goal is to become the only platform a homeowner ever needs, covering every service category under one roof. Three brands — LawnStarter, Lawn Love, and Home Gnome — all running off the same shared platform. One team. One foundation. A lot of room left to grow.

Engineering here looks a little different
Two years ago, we stopped patching things and rebuilt properly. New customer app. Fresh Pro onboarding. A job distribution engine that actually holds up under load. Data infrastructure we're not embarrassed by. That work is behind us now, and the foundation is genuinely solid.
What's ahead is more interesting — new service verticals, dynamic pricing, AI features built to run at real scale. The stack is PHP with Laravel on the backend, React and React Native on the front end, and Cypress as our primary test framework. Claude Code isn't a pilot program here. It's just how the team works.

So, what's this role actually about?
Scaling into new verticals fast means quality has to stay ahead of the product — not scramble to catch up after the fact. That's the whole reason this position exists. Someone needs to own the automation strategy, keep the bug lifecycle from becoming a black hole, and stay close enough to Product and Design that problems get flagged before they ever hit a customer.
You'd report to the Engineering Manager and work across the entire engineering org rather than sitting in one isolated corner of it. The work is genuinely hands-on, but it's also strategic. You'd have real influence over how the team operates — not just how your own test files are written.
Three things set this apart from a standard QA role:
You'd work directly with engineers, PMs, designers, and the data team — not just receive specs to verify. Surfacing risks early enough for something to actually be done about them is part of the job description, not a bonus. You might be embedded in one or two delivery teams depending on where the need is greatest.
The automation strategy is yours to set. Not someone else's plan to execute — yours to build from the ground up, evolve over time, and defend when needed.
When you find a gap in how the team ships software, you're expected to fix it. Not write it up. Fix it.

What you'd actually be doing day to day:
Building and expanding the E2E and integration test suite in Cypress. Setting coverage priorities, closing the gaps that matter most, and making sure the suite stays useful as the product keeps changing.
Owning bugs from triage all the way through to production fix. Keeping the process moving. Keeping stakeholders informed without them having to ask.
Getting into requirements conversations early — before anyone writes code. Sitting with PMs, designers, and the data team to ask the questions that haven't been asked yet, and making sure "done" means the same thing to everyone in the room.
Spotting what's broken in how we deliver software and doing something about it. Not a deck. Not a proposal. An actual shipped improvement.
Testing new features and existing flows on real devices — web and mobile — and catching the edge cases a script would never think to look for.

Two problems worth knowing about upfront:
The first is keeping coverage sharp as things evolve. The E2E suite is in solid shape today. Keeping it that way as new verticals come online, new flows get built, and the product keeps changing — that's the ongoing challenge. It takes someone who thinks proactively about coverage, not reactively.
The second is figuring out where AI actually helps. This isn't theoretical. There's real room to cut repetitive work, find blind spots faster, and improve how bugs get caught before they ship. We want someone who's actively running experiments here — trying tools, seeing what sticks, and bringing what they learn back to the team. Not waiting to be told what to try.

If you're succeeding a year from now, here's what that looks like:
New features ship with automated tests already in place — not added later as an afterthought. Your coverage strategy has evolved with the product at least once, probably more.
The bug process is predictable. People know where things stand without having to chase anyone down.
You understand how the marketplace actually works — well enough to catch edge cases nobody thought to spec out.
Something real has changed about how the team delivers quality. Not a document. A live improvement the team actually uses.

Who fits here:
Someone who uses AI as a normal working tool. Claude Code, browser MCPs, agent workflows, scripts that automate the tedious parts — this should already be part of how you work, not something you're curious about trying. If you're skeptical about AI having a place in engineering, this environment will probably wear on you.
Someone whose first instinct when they find a problem is to prevent it automatically next time. You think in infrastructure, not one-off fixes. If manual testing is genuinely where your strength lives, this role will push you into uncomfortable territory fast.
Someone who tests like a customer, not like a spec reader. The question isn't whether the behavior matches the ticket. It's whether a real person can accomplish what they came to do.
Someone who adapts without drama. Tools shift. Processes shift. The way software gets built is changing faster than most people expected, and a lot of that is because of AI. You either move with it or you find yourself constantly behind.
Someone direct enough to say something when a feature isn't ready. You work across Product, Design, Engineering, and Operations. Softening feedback to avoid friction creates problems everyone has to deal with later.
Someone technically capable across the stack. Comfortable reading and writing code. Solid enough on front-end and back-end services to test them properly. Can write meaningful SQL. Can debug something without already knowing exactly where to look.

What this role is not — worth being clear about:
Not a manual testing job. If automation isn't where most of your actual effort goes, that's a mismatch.
Not a backlog job. You'd shape what gets worked on, not just move tickets from one column to another.
Not a Cypress-forever job. We use it now. That could change. Being attached to one framework would limit you here.
Not a role for someone who needs full clarity before they move. New verticals bring new unknowns. You have to be comfortable making judgment calls before all the answers exist.
Not a backseat role. Quality is treated as a genuine priority here, and you'd be expected to have opinions and bring them upstream — not just verify what's already shipped.

Pay and benefits:
Base salary: $45,000–$65,000

Equity — because we want you thinking about the long-term health of what you're building, not just this quarter's sprint

Fully remote across the Americas — async-first, results-focused, no performative office hours

Unlimited PTO — we track outcomes, not time logged
LawnStarter is an equal opportunity employer and doesn't discriminate based on race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, genetics, or any other status protected under applicable law.