Technical interview prep: what the rounds test and a four-week plan
Coding interviews test whether you can solve an unfamiliar problem out loud, in working code, under time. Amazon, Meta and Google give the same advice on their own prep pages: ask clarifying questions, think out loud, start simple, write real code without an IDE, then test it and discuss complexity. amazon.jobs metacareers.com services.google.com
What do Amazon, Meta and Google test in technical interviews?
| Company | Format they describe | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Amazon (SDE II) | Online assessment: 90 minutes for two coding questions, about 20 minutes of system design scenarios, and a work style survey. Then four 55-minute interviews, with at least one system design question. | amazon.jobs |
| Meta (software engineer) | A 45-minute screen with about 35 minutes for two coding problems. The full loop adds harder coding, a design round and a behavioral round. | metacareers.com |
| Google (technical internships) | Two 45-minute technical interviews in a shared document, then independent committee review. | services.google.com |
Meta's page dates from 2022 and Google's guide from 2018. Formats change, so ask your recruiter what your loop includes. Amazon says the same: ask your recruiting contact which subjects your interview will cover. amazon.jobs
What habits do coding interviewers look for?
- Clarify first. Google says its questions are often left underspecified on purpose. services.google.com
- Think out loud. The interviewer scores your reasoning, not only the final answer. metacareers.com
- Get a working solution, then improve it. A brute-force answer you can explain beats an optimal one you cannot finish. services.google.com
- Write real code, without an IDE. amazon.jobs
- Test it yourself. Walk through edge cases and state the time and space complexity before you are asked. metacareers.com
Interviewers assess how you apply knowledge, not what you memorized.Paraphrased from Amazon's software development topics page
What should you review for a coding interview?
Meta lists graphs, trees, heaps, hash maps, and breadth-first and depth-first search. metacareers.com Google's guide adds Big-O, sorting and hash tables. services.google.com Amazon's list is broader: data structures, algorithms, object-oriented design, databases, distributed computing and operating systems. amazon.jobs For system design, Meta's order is requirements, then a high-level outline, then the hard parts and their tradeoffs. metacareers.com
A four-week plan
About an hour a day
- Week 1: one problem a day in a plain editor, out loud, 35 minutes on the clock.
- Week 2: the same, plus one free AI mock on interviewing.io.
- Week 3: two system design walk-throughs, requirements first.
- Week 4: one or two human mocks, then rest the day before.
Which tools should you use each week?
Problem drills: LeetCode Premium adds company-tagged questions and timed Interview Simulations, at $35 a month or $159 a year. leetcode.com NeetCode lists 300+ problems with video explanations in its Pro plan. neetcode.io Mock interviews: interviewing.io, with a free AI Interviewer and human sessions from $179. interviewing.io System design: Hello Interview's guided practice. hellointerview.com Free practice with a person: Aced's peer mocks, 5 a month on its free plan. aced.io
Practice with AI as much as you like. During the interview, use it only if the company says you may. 404 Media reported that Meta planned coding interviews where candidates may use AI; Anthropic and Amazon tell candidates not to use unauthorized AI. See our page on live copilots.
Questions
- Should I write real code or pseudocode in a coding interview?
- Real code. Amazon's SDE II prep page asks for syntactically correct code, and Google's internship guide asks for real code rather than pseudocode.
- Should I practice with an IDE?
- Practice without one. Amazon tells candidates to practice without an IDE, and Meta suggests a plain text editor without autocomplete.
- How do I prepare for a system design round?
- Practice gathering requirements first, then a high-level outline, then the hard parts and their tradeoffs. That is the order Meta's prep guide gives.