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      Software Engineer Interview

      Aug 21, 2013
      Anonymous interview candidate
      Redmond, WA
      No offer
      Positive experience
      Difficult interview

      Application

      I applied through university. The process took 5 weeks. I interviewed at Microsoft (Redmond, WA) in May 2013

      Interview

      I first applied for the position while a recruiter was at my college for a job fair event. After that, I was contacted about a month or so later and scheduled a phone interview (or rather an online phone interview). The phone interview was all business, no personal questions. The interviewer asked me to start writing something that seemed somewhat simple, in whichever language I preferred. After a sufficient amount of time coding and asking questions (roughly 45 minutes) he had me stop and asked a couple of questions on my thought process in coding the answer. I was contacted a few days later and asked if I could fly out for an interview. I accepted and went to their headquarters in Washington. The day starts relatively early, around 9:30AM and goes "until you're finished". The basic process is they hand you the location of your first interview, either walk you there or get you a ride there, and continue handing you off between Microsoft employees that you will potentially be working with. Usually each person asks you a couple of personal questions and at least one coding question. Some people may seem like they're ignoring you or acting strangely around you, but I believe that's all part of the interview process. Asking questions is a vital part of the process, as they want someone who is willing to understand something from top to bottom before they attempt to write code for it. As some other reviews have said, towards the end of the day you may or may not meet with your fifth interviewer in the event that they may "be busy". Whether or not this is truly an indicator of your progress, I'm unsure. All I can say is I interviewed with four out of five people and did not receive the offer. Fortunately, I heard back the very next day, so there wasn't too much anticipation.

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      Most of the questions were difficult. Expect a lot of questions that really challenge your grasp on more advanced CS fundamentals.
      Answer question
      6

      Other Software Engineer interview reviews for Microsoft

      Software Engineer Interview

      May 5, 2026
      Anonymous employee
      Accepted offer
      Positive experience
      Difficult interview

      Application

      I interviewed at Microsoft

      Interview

      The interview was a long process. There was first the recruiter screen, which was followed by a 4-loop interview structure that covered technical, behavioral, and system design. The interviewers were very kind and accommodating.

      Software Engineer Interview

      May 4, 2026
      Anonymous interview candidate
      No offer
      Negative experience
      Average interview

      Application

      I applied online. The process took 3 weeks. I interviewed at Microsoft

      Interview

      After my application to ClipChamp - Microsoft, a recruiter reached out and scheduled my first interview. It was about basic interview questions and background analysis. After that I had my technical interview. The recruiter specifically said that I would be facing medium hacker rank questions. So I prepared accordingly. However, what I actually got was to analyse an application and re work it according to new requirements. I felt like I was set up for failure on purpose. Didn’t even hear back after that interview.

      Software Engineer Interview

      May 1, 2026
      Anonymous interview candidate
      Declined offer
      Neutral experience
      Easy interview

      Application

      I interviewed at Microsoft

      Interview

      Took a bit longer than I thought, spanning about three weeks from start to finish. After a quick recruiter screen, I had a technical round where I was asked about validating a binary search tree. The wild part is, I had literally seen this exact problem on prachub.com while prepping. It helped me feel more confident discussing my approach and edge cases. There was also a behavioral interview where I shared my experiences, and eventually, I received an offer. I chose to decline it, though, as it wasn't the right fit for me at the time.

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