I applied online. The process took 2 months. I interviewed at Datadog (Paris) in Sep 2020
Interview
There were 7 interviews total if you include the HR related phone calls. 2 Leetcode style tests, an 8 hour takehome assignment and a "system design interview" which is actually just a UI design interview, not a system design interview... Still not sure why they labelled it as such.
This took place over the course of about 2 months.
After all was completed, I got a phone call from the recruiter saying that I aced every single technical interview, but they didn't hire me because I didn't know the "definition" of the "event loop" in Node.js.
It's true, I didn't know exactly what it was called in my interview with the hiring manager, and I could tell immediately he thought I was a moron. However:
A. You can literally google what terms mean.
B. The event loop, and understanding of it, is a concept I leverage successfully on a daily basis at my job, and successfully used in the coding assignment THEY sent me, which they said was one of their best submissions.
So my advice to Data Dog would be to make the interview with the elitist, gatekeeping hiring manager at the beginning of the process, instead of at the end so that misunderstandings like this can be avoided, and 2 months of my time can avoid being wasted.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
First leetcode was the coin change problem, but you can use a greedy algorithm to solve it since the denominations include a 1 dollar coin. If you solve it fast they follow up with a very easy tree navigating problem.
The second leet code was related to RegEx where they invent a regular expression to match strings, and you build an algorithm that performs the match. Much easier than it sounds, just think it through.
The takehome assignment takes between 6-10 hours and involve building an application that displays statistics about your current and historical CPU load. They give you a lot of good hints, so focus on making it pretty and flashy.
The "system design" interview is just a UI interview in disguise. They'll describe an application and you just have to come up with what the UI looks like, and ask questions about tradeoffs and what the user's requirements are. Don't dive into system design details, because they will ask you to get back on task with the UI stuff.
I applied through an employee referral. I interviewed at Datadog (Paris) in Oct 2025
Interview
1 HR screening ( 30 min )
Then
1 Initial coding interview (45 min)
Then
Onsite React interview (1h)
Frontend System design interview (1h)
System design interview ( with something I actually worked on ) ( 45 min )
Behavioral interview ( 45 min )
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Usual behavioral interview questions : tell me about a time you failed/mentored/delivered under pressure etc...
First I had a session with HR to understand if we were aligned. After that, there was a coding interview, with 2 interviwers and a leet-code like exercise. They send a very detailed email clarifying what we should know to succeed in the interview.
The process took 2 weeks. I interviewed at Datadog (London, England) in Jul 2024
Interview
The interview process included an initial Zoom with a recruiter, followed by a technical interview with a senior engineer. The final stage was a video interview involving both behavioral questions and technical challenges.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
I was asked to solve a modified version of the LeetCode coin change problem, where I had to return the count of each coin used to make the minimum amount.