I applied online. The process took 1 week. I interviewed at Amazon in Oct 2024
Interview
I am describing the Online Assessment.
2 coding challenges hosted on hackerrank.com. Given 1.5 hours to complete both problems. This process assesses your ability to solve a difficult brain teaser and then write code to execute your solution. Writing the code is the easy part; coming up with the solution is the hard part. Imagine if you were asked to write code to solve a Rubik's Cube without already knowing or being told the algorithm for solving a Rubik's Cube.
I've read other reviews of Amazon's Software Development Engineer interview process here on Glassdoor and it seems others got much easier questions than I did. Could be based on the seniority of the role applying for or could be some random factor involved.
After the 2 questions was a work simulation in which you read simulated emails from coworkers describing to you their requirements for new development projects. You're given a list of 5 or 6 technologies or next steps and asked to assign a ranking to each one based on how effective those technologies or next steps would be. For example, you're told you need to develop distributed storage of thumbnail images. How effective would cloud storage be for solving this requirement? How effective would elastic search be? Etc.
This portion of the interview is not timed.
The final portion of the online assessment is where you're shown 2 sentences describing different ideologies or behavioral traits and you must say whether one or the other Best Describes you or Better Describes you. This portion was also not timed. It took about 20 minutes to complete.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Given an array of integers, write code (you choose the language) that will return the minimum number of elements that must be changed such that every subarray of a given length will have the same sum.
I applied online. I interviewed at Amazon (Berlin)
Interview
For the first stage, I did an online assessment, which had 2 DSA-type questions with some workstyle questions.
The second stage, was an hour phone screening where I was asked some behavioral type questions with 2 DSA questions (One of the questions was easy and the other was hard).
I applied through a recruiter. The process took 5 days. I interviewed at Amazon (Minneapolis, MN) in Mar 2024
Interview
I've interviewed at Amazon a few times. Ever since they've implemented their coding challenge, it's made the entire process pointless. Before, technical interviews were done with an Amazon developer and they could ask questions while you're writing out code. They could see how you approach problems, how you break down complexity. Basically, it was an evaluation of your skill as an engineer.
Now, the coding challenge is really more a test of your typing skills, the performance of the site's compiler, etc. It's a task that could easily be done by copy-pasting from some other site, but that's against the rules. It just gives you an entirely alien coding experience that doesn't actually measure anything that would indicate your quality as an engineer.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Create an algorithm that does some string manipulation