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      Software Engineer Interview

      Apr 2, 2014
      Anonymous interview candidate
      Mountain View, CA
      No offer
      Positive experience
      Average interview

      Application

      I applied through an employee referral. The process took 7 weeks. I interviewed at Google (Mountain View, CA) in Mar 2014

      Interview

      I applied to Google through an employee referral, and heard back from a recruiter within a week of them receiving my resume. The process was pretty quick and easy -- only a few required forms prior to my phone screening. The phone interview was a simple data structure question requiring ~25 lines of Java code. After the interview, I was then offered to fly to Mountain View for an on-site interview. This consisted of four 45-minute interviews, plus an hour for lunch. All of them were algorithm/data structure questions (trees, graphs, arrays), so I can't comment on the nature of the design style questions. In two of these interviews, I successfully answered the first question and was asked a second. In one interview I answered the first question and we discussed my resume for the remaining time. The final interview was a bit more tricky, requiring careful handling of edge cases, so I got a bit mixed up and wasn't able to fully complete the problem (I did have a full whiteboard of code by the end of it). I felt good about the interview, but was notified 2.5 weeks later that the hiring committee decided not to continue the process. My recruiter suggested I get more experience, but cited no more reasons beyond that.

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      Data structures and algorithms are a must. The most complicated algorithm one would use in these sorts of interviews might be Dijkstra's (all of my questions were simpler though). Get used to coding on a whiteboard and be sure to understand the problem fully before jumping into the code. Bring thin-chisel markers, especially if you anticipate writing a couple of long lines of code.
      Answer question
      4

      Other Software Engineer interview reviews for Google

      Software Engineer Interview

      May 4, 2014
      Anonymous employee
      Auburndale, FL
      Accepted offer
      Positive experience
      Difficult interview

      Application

      I applied through an employee referral. I interviewed at Google (Auburndale, FL) in Apr 2014

      Interview

      Direct onsite because I interviewed in the past and did well that time. From the time I sent my resume to interview day: 2 weeks. From interview day to offer over the phone: 2 weeks. The syllabus for the interviews is very clear and simple: 1) Dynamic Programming 2) Super recursion (permutation, combination,...2^n, m^n, n!...etc. type of program. (NP hard, NP programs) 3) Probability related programs 4) Graphs: BFS/DFS are usually enough 5) All basic data structures from Arrays/Lists to circular queues, BSTs, Hash tables, B-Trees, and Red-Black trees, and all basic algorithms like sorting, binary search, median,... 6) Problem solving ability at a level similar to TopCoder Division 1, 250 points. If you can consistently solve these, then you are almost sure to get in with 2-weeks brush up. 7) Review all old interview questions in Glassdoor to get a feel. If you can solve 95% of them at home (including coding them up quickly and testing them out in a debugger + editor setup), you are in good shape. 8) Practice coding--write often and write a lot. If you can think of a solution, you should be able to code it easily...without much thought. 9) Very good to have for design interview: distributed systems knowledge and practical experience. 10) Good understanding of basic discrete math, computer architecture, basic math. 11) Coursera courses and assignments give a lot of what you need to know. 12) Note that all the above except the first 2 are useful in "real life" programming too! Interview 1: Graph related question and super recursion Interview 2: Design discussion involving a distributed system with writes/reads going on at different sites in parallel. Interview 3: Array and Tree related questions Interview 4: Designing a simple class to do something. Not hard, but not easy either. You need to know basic data structures very well to consider different designs and trade-offs. Interview 5: Dynamic programming, Computer architecture and low level perf. enhancement question which requires knowledge of Trees, binary search, etc. At the end, I wasn't tired and rather enjoyed the discussions. I think the key was long term preparation and time spent doing topcoder for several years (on and off as I enjoy solving the problems). Conclusion: "It's not the best who win the race; it's the best prepared who win it."
      2501

      Software Engineer Interview

      Jun 23, 2026
      Anonymous interview candidate
      No offer
      Positive experience
      Difficult interview

      Application

      I interviewed at Google

      Interview

      2 rounds of interviews with the first round being a technical and a behaverial. The second round being two technicals. The format was straight forward and the interviewer was professional.

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      Talk about how you resolve a conflict.
      Answer question

      Software Engineer Interview

      Jun 24, 2026
      Anonymous interview candidate
      No offer
      Neutral experience
      Average interview

      Application

      I interviewed at Google

      Interview

      There was a technical screen within their coding platform, followed by a first-round technical interview, followed by a first-round behavioral interview, followed by second-round interviews, both technical and behavioral interviews.

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      What was your role on a technical project you've worked on?
      Answer question