Software Engineer applicants have rated the interview process at Amazon with 3.3 out of 5 (where 5 is the highest level of difficulty) and assessed their interview experience as 67% positive. To compare, the company-average is 61.5% positive. This is according to Glassdoor user ratings.
Here are the most commonly searched roles for interview reports -
I applied through a recruiter. The process took 1 day. I interviewed at Amazon (Seattle, WA) in Apr 2011
Interview
The interviewer was friendly and started telling about amazon.com and later told me to explain about my background. Later ask me to describe challenging role faced in latest project. OOPS concepts, UML diagrams, and implementation of that diagram. Most of time where around the class diagram, implementation and some scenario based on the UML diagram. He asked me to design Company Organization UML diagram (include all methods) with following constraints:
1. Manager can have some manager or workers reporting to him
2. No body should report to workers
3. Include functionality like ADD, Search, Remove Employee (how and where you will implement these methods).
He told me that I can expect second round with hardcore coding.
Interview questions [3]
Question 1
I am your student can you please explain me HashTable? What is chaining?
Please give example.
There are 199 elements in array. It has only one distinct value? How will find this distinct value? Also for solution please tell about O(n)?How can you make it more efficient?
Design a generic UML diagram for an organization that can be implemented for all the companies (from small to large)? Include reporting structure, adding, search, and removing employee.
I applied through an employee referral. The process took 1 day. I interviewed at Amazon (Seattle, WA) in Mar 2011
Interview
I'm a master's student in computer science and my advisor approached me about a possible opportunity with Amazon. One of her former students now works for the company and had told her they were looking for software developers. I submitted my resume via email and was scheduled for a phone interview within the week. A few hours before the interview I received an email stating they needed to postpone it until the next week.
I finally received the call after 7 days of waiting and proceeded with the phone screening. The interview was being conducted by one of their developers, so the expectation of technical knowledge was high. He was courteous and friendly but immediately got down to business with the first questions. The interview consisted of a few short-answer questions and several more open-ended problems dealing with algorithms and software design. The questions were fair and not overly difficult, and the interviewer offered a few hints and nudges in the right direction when I got stuck on something.
I've heard from others that there is something of an "Amazon culture" of cockiness and a general attitude of being the best at what they do (which certainly may be well deserved judging by the size and success of the company). I did get something of a sense of this when I was asking my questions at the end of the interview--when I asked the developer what his favorite part about working at Amazon was, he immediately replied that it was the confidence that he could solve virtually any problem posed to him, no matter how large. Again, he was polite and helpful through the entire call, but he wasn't much for smalltalk or joking around. From word of mouth and my conversation with this developer it seems like a pretty serious work environment.
Write an algorithm to output every possible string that can generated by a given 10-digit telephone number. (You know, how when you look at your phone's keypad the number 2 corresponds to A, B, or C, the number 9 corresponds to W, X, Y, or Z, etc.)
I applied online. The process took 3 days. I interviewed at Amazon (Seattle, WA) in Feb 2011
Interview
Posted resume online, recruited contacted me the next week. Phone interview a couple days later, and another two days later. The interviewers were very nice and made the process pleasant. Offered me to fly to amazon, but then realized I did not have enough professional experience for the position.
Interview questions [3]
Question 1
Your website is slowing down. How do you find the cause of the problem?