real interview stories, told over a cup of tea ♡
Interview Experiences
3935 interview stories from candidates at 857 companies: how each round went, what was asked and how it ended. Every company page links to practice questions in the same style.
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3935 results
- ADCI - Karnataka Software Engineer Interview Experience: rising coding difficulty under time pressureADCI - Karnataka · Software Engineer · Aug 2026
My first assessment round involved difficult coding with limited time. I remember occasional helpful hints, but it was still very hard to finish under the clock. The questions grew harder as the round went on, which made the final part the most stressful. I was also frustrated that there was not more real-time guidance from an interviewer while I worked. I did not complete the full coding portion…
- ADCI - Karnataka Software Engineer Interview Experience: Standard systems and LeetCode roundsADCI - Karnataka · Software Engineer · Aug 2026
I went through technical rounds on systems and database knowledge, along with the usual LeetCode problems you see online. There were also behavioral rounds with stressful questions meant to evaluate social and communication skills. It felt boring and outdated to me, and I did not get an offer. I was disappointed by more than the outcome. The process did not bring anything new even though I had pu…
- ADCI - Karnataka Software Engineer Interview Experience: timed recruiter, coding, and final-loop stagesADCI - Karnataka · Software Engineer · HR Screen · Aug 2026
I went through a three-round structure with clear time blocks: a recruiter screen, a one-hour technical screen, and a final loop made up of five interviews. The technical screen was tightly scheduled. It began with a short introduction, moved into behavioral questions, then a dedicated coding segment, and finished with a brief period for my questions. I did not receive an offer. What I remember m…
- ADCI - Karnataka Software Engineer Interview Experience: two 60 minute in person roundsADCI - Karnataka · Software Engineer · HR Screen · Aug 2026
I started with HR questions soon after applying, then moved into tightly scheduled in person sessions. The loop had two back to back rounds: one with a hiring manager and one with an engineer. Each lasted about 60 minutes. The first 15 minutes of each were behavioral, and the remaining time was for DSA. The DSA portion carried the usual expectation to explain my thinking clearly. The format place…
- ADCI - Karnataka Software Engineer Interview Experience: Two coding questions per roundADCI - Karnataka · Software Engineer · Online Assessment · Aug 2026
I started with an online assessment containing two coding questions. Within a few days I was selected for the next round, a computer-fundamentals MCQ with about nine sections. After clearing it, I received an interview invitation for two technical rounds. Each technical round had two questions. The topics ranged from basic math to graphs, trees, and HashMap-related problems. The format was very f…
- ADCI - Karnataka Software Engineer Interview Experience: uneven onsite question difficultyADCI - Karnataka · Software Engineer · Onsite · Aug 2026
I think my loop followed a classic coding-and-design structure, but the outcome went against me. I went through an assessment and several later stages. By the final onsite setup, it felt as though I was competing against other interviewers' question sets. At the onsite stage, I had the impression that some candidates got standard LeetCode questions while others got harder, less familiar variants.…
- ADCI - Karnataka Software Engineer Interview Experience: Virtual DSA OA and timed Zoom roundADCI - Karnataka · Software Engineer · Online Assessment · Aug 2026
I was invited to a virtual OA with multiple DSA problems that went from easy to harder at the end. After that, the process had two timed parts: a Zoom session with a LeetCode-medium block followed by behavioral questions. The coding portion lasted about 30 minutes, and the behavioral portion took another 30. The behavioral questions were a real shift in pace immediately after the technical sectio…
- ADCI - Karnataka Software Engineer Interview Experience: Word Search II, House Robber, and OOP designADCI - Karnataka · Software Engineer · Aug 2026
My interview ran across two days, with two rounds each day and about an hour per round. Because the content varied by interviewer, it did not feel completely scripted. Round one had two leadership-principle questions and Word Search II. I started with a fixed grid size, then had to explain how I would handle a grid whose size was no longer fixed. Round two was only leadership-principle questions.…
- ADCI - Karnataka Software Engineer Interview Experience: workday simulation and three final interviewsADCI - Karnataka · Software Engineer · Online Assessment · Aug 2026
My loop began with an OA HackerRank round. Within two days, I had a second round that became a workday simulation. I pretended to be an Amazon SDE and talked through decisions about issues that come up in that job. It was less about producing a lot of untested code and more about how I would handle real-world tradeoffs and choices. The final stage was three back-to-back one-hour interviews, each…
- ADCI - Karnataka Software Engineer interview with book system designADCI - Karnataka · Software Engineer · Technical Screen · Aug 2026Offer
I had a face-to-face loop with four rounds. It began with two DSA questions, one on binary search and one on binary trees. Next came an LLD round where I designed a book management system, followed by a hiring-manager round and a leadership round. The leadership questions were closely tied to leadership principles, and those themes also came up in the technical rounds. I received an offer. My ove…
- Affirm Software Engineer Interview Experience: payments design and poor recruiter communicationAffirm · Software Engineer · HR Screen · Aug 2026Rejected
After an initial recruiter call, I entered a fintech-focused process. The roughly 30-minute screen covered my background, interest in fintech and BNPL, compensation, and location. A deeper hiring-manager conversation followed, covering past projects, technical decisions, and fit for the specific team. The coding portion was a 60-minute HackerRank session. Next came about an hour of system design…
- Agent Metrics, Tool Debugging, and GraphsByteDance · Software Engineer · Intern · Technical Screen · Aug 2026
The interviewer opened with, "Do you speak Chinese?" After I said yes, we spoke Chinese for the entire interview. I gave a brief introduction, then we went straight into questions. Fundamentals / business design Memory and virtual memory: Follow-up: What is virtual memory for? Follow-up: Can virtual memory space (VRAM) be larger than physical memory (RAM)? The reasoning we discussed: Yes. Virtual…
- Aggressive Interruptions on a Coding Phone ScreenApplied Intuition · Software Engineer · Technical Screen · Aug 2026
HR call: Two different HR people reached out to me. It was basically background chat. The first HR felt like they came out of a frat, very flippant, and asked me this kind of dumb question about why I'd choose to accept a return offer and go back to a certain company as a full-time employee. The second one asked what I wanted out of my next job, and then asked to schedule the interview right ther…
- Agoda Software Engineer interview with screen-shared JavaScript codingAgoda · Software Engineer · Technical Screen · Aug 2026
After speaking with a recruiter, I moved to a hands-on technical stage where I shared my screen. The exercise resembled a common LeetCode format and was not tied to one programming language. I used JavaScript even though the role leaned more toward Java. The developer running the session was approachable and supportive, so it felt more collaborative than competitive. I left with a positive impres…
- AI QA Workflow Design and an Unfinished Merge IntervalsByteDance · Senior SDE, Quality Platform & AI Test Automation · Senior+ · Technical Screen · Aug 2026
Good luck to everyone. I hope my bad example can help someone. Location: San Jose Role: Senior SDE, Quality Platform & AI Test Automation Interviewer: The team's QA leader; the interview was in Chinese over video with a shared whiteboard. Background: More than ten years in DevOps and engineering productivity. I have built CI/CD platforms and an AI code-review platform. How the interviewer framed…
- AI Safety Questions Before a Phone-Interview InvitationAnthropic · Software Engineer · HR Screen · Aug 2026In progress
After applying to more than a dozen roles, HR finally contacted me. They asked a lot of questions about AI safety and security. How is Anthropic different from other AI labs? What does AI safety mean to you? What will happen if AI is not properly used? Have you followed Anthropic's recent moves? What did we do right or wrong? Why do you want to work at Anthropic? What do you think are the biggest…
- AI-Assisted Coding Round and a Four-Session OnsiteFurther AI · Machine Learning Engineer · Senior+ · Onsite · Aug 2026
Further AI is a Series A startup that automates insurance underwriting. I interviewed for Staff Applied AI Engineer. The whole process was 3 rounds. Round 1: HM phone screen (15 minutes), mainly to see if there's a fit. We talked about projects I had done before, and they asked about my experience with and interest in using AI. Pretty relaxed overall. Round 2: Two 45-minute coding sessions. Merge…
- AI-Assisted Coding Rounds and a Manager Track Moved to ICShopify · Software Engineer · Senior+ · Onsite · Aug 2026Offer
I'm about to start at Shopify as a Senior SWE, and I genuinely enjoyed how their interview process worked. Two coding rounds where AI help is allowed. One was the screen and the other sat inside the onsite. You can work in your own IDE on your own laptop. I went with VS Code and Claude Sonnet, which felt slightly quicker than Opus and gave me results just as good. One technical deep dive. Draw yo…
- AI-Assisted Logger Handler Screen on HackerRankRippling · Software Engineer · Technical Screen · Aug 2026
I used my own AI + IDE. The problem was on HackerRank and I shared my screen the whole time. I got the logger problem. Part 1 A logger has handlers. Each handler is independent. Handler types: Remove all occurrences of a configured string, then print. Truncate to N characters, then print. Uppercase the whole message, then print. Store the message in an internal array without printing. Discuss the…
- AI-Assisted OA and Pair ProgrammingColor Health · Software Engineer · New Grad · Technical Screen · Aug 2026Rejected
Color Health new graduate interview experience. Timeline I applied to this role twice. I received no response after the first application in mid-April. After applying a second time in late July, the recruiter reached out on August 5. August 7: received the online assessment. August 12: the recruiter replied that I had passed the assessment and scheduled a screening call. August 13: recruiter scre…
- AI-Assisted Phone Screens, Rejected After Four Onsite RoundsStripe · Software Engineer · Senior+ · Onsite · Aug 2026Rejected
Two phone screens, coding with AI. My feeling is that you basically just need to show your ability to interact with AI — let the AI write all the code, and your job is mainly to review it, ask it what algorithm to use, how to design the functions and classes, and then once the code is done you comment on the problems with what it wrote. That's basically fine. I don't remember the actual problem.…
- AI-Assisted Take-Home Plus a One-Take Code Walkthrough VideoComposio · Fullstack Engineer · New Grad · Take-home Project · Aug 2026In progress
I'm an OSU CS master's student, graduating in December 2026. Process. It's on a platform called Litmus. You run litmus init and that starts a 150-minute timer that can't be paused. The problem: you're given an API catalog with a few hundred tools (each with full input/output JSON Schema), and you write a generator that automatically infers the dependency graph between tools — i.e. which tool's mi…
- AI-Coding Phone Screen, Rejected After Onsite Coding RoundeBay · Software Engineer · Onsite · Aug 2026Rejected
In June, an HR person reached out about an MTS role, and we talked through some behavioral questions and my project experience. Phone screen: AI coding — basically they give you some code and have you spot design pattern issues (like something not being extensible), or point out a bad data type. On CodeSignal, the AI is really strong and basically does the work for you. You just need to talk thro…
- Airtel Payments Bank Software Engineer interview with cab-booking database designAirtel Payments Bank · Software Engineer · Online Assessment · Aug 2026Offer
After a recruiter call, I had an assessment and then a couple of deeper conversations. The first round checked coding and fundamentals. I worked through cab-booking-style queries, including how to normalize a database and what indexes to add on relevant columns. Java collections also came up, along with a linked-list DSA challenge. The technical discussion felt more like a guided deep dive than a…
- Airwallex Pty Software Engineer Interview Experience: CTO database-modeling pivot after positive signalsAirwallex Pty · Software Engineer · HR Screen · Aug 2026Rejected
I went through an intense sequence that ended in a final-round rejection. After a recruiter call, I had live coding, a system-design round, and behavioral questions. The difficulty felt average until then. The final CTO round was what threw me off. He repeated questions that had already been covered in a behavioral conversation with a senior director, then concluded that I was not a good fit. He…
- Airwallex Pty Software Engineer interview experience: unclear role fit and rejectionAirwallex Pty · Software Engineer · HR Screen · Aug 2026Rejected
The recruiter stage is what I remember most, and it set a poor tone. After the HR conversation, there was back-and-forth about the roles and where my background might fit, but I never got a clear picture of what I was actually being considered for. Instead of entering a full interview loop, I received a rejection email saying I was not selected for either role we had discussed. Another experience…
- Airwallex Software Engineer Interview Experience: CTO rejection after full loopAirwallex · Software Engineer · HR Screen · Aug 2026Rejected
I completed the full Software Engineer loop, which ended with the CTO. After the recruiter conversation, I had live coding, system design, and behavioral rounds. They were standard and aligned with the role. The CTO round did not feel like a fresh evaluation. He repeated many of the questions that had come up earlier with a senior director in the behavioral discussion. Along with lower-level tech…
- Airwallex Software Engineer Interview Experience: HR discussed a second role before rejecting bothAirwallex · Software Engineer · HR Screen · Aug 2026Rejected
My process with Airwallex was straightforward until the HR call. The HR interviewer asked about my background and said that, based on what I shared, another role might suit the team better. We discussed that opportunity and went back and forth enough that it felt as though things were moving. Then it ended quickly. I received a rejection email saying I was not selected for either role we had disc…
- ALDO Group Account Executive Interview Experience: helping a customer choose shoesALDO Group · Account Executive · Other · Aug 2026Offer
After a simple start, I had a friendly video or in store conversation with a store manager. It was relaxed, and I had time to ask questions, but it was still structured enough that I understood what they wanted. We discussed the role, the day to day work, why I wanted the position, and why I was leaving my current job. The manager also asked how I would handle an upset customer or help someone ch…
- Algorithms, Data Structures, Bash, and DiceSquarepoint · Quantitative Researcher · Technical Screen · Aug 2026
Short version: two algorithm questions, one data-structure question, one development-related question, and one statistics question. For an array of n positive integers arr[n] and an integer k, a subarray is good if it contains at least k distinct integers. Find the minimum length of a good subarray; otherwise return -1. Given a list containing an odd number of positive integers, you may remove ex…
