I applied online. The process took 1 week. I interviewed at Retool (San Francisco, CA) in Jul 2023
Interview
Initial Recruiter Call – Brief introduction, discussion of background, role fit, and logistics.
Technical Screen – Usually a 45–60 min coding or problem-solving session (data structures, algorithms, or small design tasks).
Onsite Loop – A series of technical and behavioral interviews:
• Technical Round: Hands-on coding or debugging exercise.
• Hiring Manager Screen: Discussion of technical depth, past projects, and team alignment.
• System Design Round: Evaluating architecture skills, scalability, tradeoffs, and communication
Recruiter call, talked about myself, my skills, why Retool
Good to practice especially if going with the frontend programming route
Scheduled 2 technical interviews. One in React to build a form and one to implement wordle's algorithms in language of choice
I applied through an employee referral. The process took 4 weeks. I interviewed at Retool in Sep 2025
Interview
Virtual: Recruiter screen, technical screen (coding & system design)
Option to come into the office for onsite: 2 coding, project deep dive, and hiring manager/behavioral
Enjoyable process - easy to schedule. Coding questions were pretty interesting and interviewers were very warm and friendly. I was very nervous for the technical coding screen and really appreciated how nice and calming the interviewer was!
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
LC medium for the technical coding screen - the rest of the coding questions felt fairly practical, fun, and iterative
The interview process did not reflect well on the company culture and people, despite my positive initial impressions. It is the worst interview experience I've had this job search amongst 16 companies.
First off, the recruiter said my technical interview wasn't going to be a LC question and they valued practical coding. I prepped for practical coding interviews, but during the phone screen it turned out to be exactly one of the classic LC questions. The interviewer was not only super disengaged (mostly silent during the interview), but also came off super arrogant, which triggered a mild panic attack that contributed to me not performing well.
The entire system design interview happened on Google docs. I was not prepped on this either, so I spent most of the hour wondering when we would switch to Excalidraw. The system design interviewer was cordial, but it was also a bit chaotic trying to nail down all the requirements. I remember being met with skepticism when I told them that a Postgres DB should be able to handle 30 RPS of search queries. The skepticism was so palpable that for a second I thought I had messed up somewhere, but in hindsight I believe it's because I didn't say the answer they were expecting and the assumptions around scale that we've agreed to painted them into a corner where simpler technological solutions could satisfy the requirements.
I really want to believe my interview experience doesn't reflect the inner-reality of the culture at Retool, but given the interview experience, I fear that this interview experience would turn away good people whom I would want to work with.
