Google Software Engineering Interview Questions & Reviews
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Updated Feb 7, 2012 – Interview questions and reviews posted anonymously by interview candidates.
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Difficulty Rating [?] Based on 371 ratings 
“Difficult” Interview
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Interview Experience [?] Based on 371 ratings
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| 1–10 of 370 Google Interviews | Sort by |
Software Engineer at Google
Posted Jan 31, 2012 — 2 of 2 people found this helpful
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3.0
Average Interview
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Overall Negative Experience
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Interviewed and No Offer
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Interviewed Aug 2010 in Mountain View, CA (took a day)
Google uses relatively junior programmers to screen candidates, because the senior programmers apparently don't want to take the time to do it. These programmers focus on computer science questions, and even if you answer their questions correctly, they don't thereafter ask you anything about your past experience or qualifications. A manager who was looking to hire someone into Google would probably do a better job of interviewing potential candidates.
Interview Questions
Other Details
The interview consisted of a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Google
Posted Jan 29, 2012 — 2 of 2 people found this helpful
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4.0
Difficult Interview
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Overall Neutral Experience
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Interviewed and No Offer
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Interviewed Sep 2010 in Mountain View, CA (took 6+ weeks)
There was one phone screen, two phone interviews, and one in person interview. The phone interviews were mostly puzzle solving and algorithms. The in person interview was all just your basic CS questions. Oddly enough they didn't ask much about my background, anything on my resume, or any of my side projects. I would recommend you know your CS algorithms and data structures, and to practice puzzle solving since you will definitely be asked a lot of those.
Interview Questions
Other Details
I got the interview through a Recruiter and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview, a 1:1 Interview and a Skills Test.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineering at Google
Posted Feb 7, 2012
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2.0
Easy Interview
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Overall Negative Experience
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Interviewed and No Offer
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Interviewed Jan 2012 in Mountain View, CA (took 1 week)
I was contacted by a Google recruiter to first schedule a phone interview.
The phone interview was to be held on the phone and through Google docs where both the interviewer and I could type in text on the same page.
When talking to the recruiter, she asked me what languages I was the strongest in. I responded that my most recent languages were C and Matlab. She said that the interview would be in one of these two languages, but that the potential on-site interview could be in anything on my resume. My most recent background is in embedded systems development, but to my complete surprise once the phone interview started, the interviewer asked questions in C++. I did answer the initial basic C++ question correctly, but I was not prepared to answer the C++ questions and I asked the interviewer if she was familiar with my background and if she could switch to C instead. She did.
During the interview she asked about software implementation of the cache driver first. We had a detailed discussion about it. Then she asked if I was familiar with binary trees. I said that I have heard of them, but never used them, and explained that I have used linked lists in the past and implemented basic search functions on them. We later discussed differences between arrays and linked lists and I answered all her questions correctly. So, in total, of the questions she did ask, I answered all of them correctly and frankly did not find them very insightful or difficult.
A week later, I received the call from the recruiter that I would not have any further interviews. Citing company policy, she declined to provide specifics. She did say that they were looking for people with broad backgrounds.
Here is what I think happened.
In short, the interviewer's background was completely different from mine. I would not have any issue with that, after all Google is a software company, but that is not how the process was explained to me. I was prepared for a completely different type of interview, based on the comments from the recruiter. Not only did the recruiter set me up for a different type of interview, the interviewer herself was completely not familiar with my background. There seem to be limited communication between the recruiter and the interviewer and little understanding of my qualifications on their behalf.
I feel misled, because I should have not been told by the recruiter that the interview would be conducted in C, whereas clearly the interviewer must have had her eyes set on C++. I would have prepared for a C++ interview if it were not for the comments by the recruiter. For sure I would have not asked to switch to C, if I had any inclination that C++ were so important to them. The interviewer should have insisted on conducting the interview in C++, if it were so important. She should have insisted on my answering the binary tree questions, if they were so important.
Lessons learned:
1. Do not take everything the recruiter tells you as 100% accurate. Google is now a large company and has large company policies, meaning the recruiter may have very limited communication with the interviewer.
2. Be prepared for any type of questions, regardless of your own background. It may not be checked.
3. Be prepared for specific skill tests, not only for evaluation of your thinking ability. In spite of Google claiming that the interview process is about determining how candidates think, it is apparently not always true. I have IQ over 170. My logic in my answers was 100% accurate, but I did not want to discuss issues I was not prepared for. I do not think the interviewer was interested in my thought process or in my thinking capability. It appears that she was merely interested in me solving academic problems that she knew the answers to.
Interview Questions
Other Details
I Applied Online and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
View Comments (1)
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Google
Posted Feb 7, 2012
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3.0
Average Interview
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Overall Positive Experience
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Received and Declined Offer
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Interviewed Dec 2010 in Mountain View, CA (took 3 weeks)
Started with tech recruiter: asked me 10 multi-choice questions around a variety of computer science stuff, Java, C++, http, etc. This was just a smoke test to weed out people quickly - if you studied CS this is really easy. Then I had two phone interviews: both were technical, asked CS algorithm style questions, runtime analysis is very important here. Then I had one onsite interview, consisting of 4 interviews. Again these questions were about data structures and algorithms (blocking queue, a heap like structure, string serialization). I liked all the interviewers, they were friendly to me and we had some great dialog. Seemed like a great place to work. They knew I had interest from other companies, so they rushed the offer process. The recruiters were very friendly, but definitely were a bit pushy wanting a decision from me quickly.
Interview Questions
Reason for Declining
The offer was strong, but the position wasn't in one of their core products. I went with another tech company (a startup) which had a much better offer and a chance to work on their core product.
Other Details
I Applied Online and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview and a 1:1 Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Google
Posted Feb 5, 2012
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3.0
Average Interview
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Overall Positive Experience
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Interviewed and No Offer
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Interviewed Jan 2012 in New York, NY (took 2+ weeks)
I got an email from a recruiter on LinkedIn. I accepted the request from the recruiter. Then the recruiter setup the 45 min phone interview with one of the google engineers which consisted of several questions pertaining to hashing, sorting and the end I needed to write a piece of code to implement one of the algorithms.
Interview Questions
Other Details
I got the interview through a Recruiter and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Google
Posted Feb 5, 2012
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4.0
Difficult Interview
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Overall Negative Experience
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Received and Declined Offer
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Interviewed Nov 2011 (took a day)
two 45min phone interviews
all about technology, algorithm, data structure
1. Compare HashTable and Binary Tree(pros and cons, why use binary tree in some place, the time complexity of insert, delete of hashtable and binarytree)
2. favorite sorting algorithm and why, advantages
3. find the longest prefix
abcde
abf
abdf
4. last internship
5. dictionary = [hello, world, top, pot, nice], source = [opt] => output = [top, opt]
First sort every element in the dictionary and source, then compare.
Interview Questions
Other Details
I Applied Online and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Google
Posted Jan 31, 2012 — 1 of 1 people found this helpful
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3.0
Average Interview
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Overall Neutral Experience
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Interviewed and No Offer
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Interviewed Nov 2011 in Berkeley, CA (took a day)
It was an on-campus interview with Google, and it was quite pleasant. I went in to the interview place, and the matched me up with two different interviewers. I had nice conversations with both interviewers. The questions were also not too difficult, but being my first real technical interview, I had no idea what to expect :(... But if you do your preparation and stay relaxed, you should be able to do fine
Interview Questions
Other Details
I Applied Online and the interview consisted of a 1:1 Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Google
Posted Feb 3, 2012
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4.0
Difficult Interview
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Overall Negative Experience
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Interviewed and No Offer
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Interviewed Jan 2012 in New York, NY (took a day)
asked technical question about algorithm . both sorting. the interviewer didn't give any hints about the question. the first interviewer called me 3 hours before the schedule, probably because of time difference. asked question about the project I have done
Interview Questions
Other Details
The interview consisted of a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Google
Posted Feb 3, 2012
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4.0
Difficult Interview
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Overall Neutral Experience
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Interviewed and No Offer
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Interviewed Nov 2011 (took a day)
two phone calls. each lasts 45 minutes.
they asked my background written on the resume, the projects in my undergraduate.
also, they asked algorithm puzzles about graph theory, string processing.
they also tested my knowledge in C++. They asked me to write a bunch of lines of code to process a simple algorithm.
Interview Questions
Other Details
The interview consisted of a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Google
Posted Feb 2, 2012
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3.0
Average Interview
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Overall Negative Experience
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Interviewed and No Offer
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Interviewed Oct 2011 (took a day)
Two back-to-back 45-minute technical phone interviews. Each takes 45 minutes.
Interview Questions
Other Details
I got the interview through a College or University and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview, a 1:1 Interview and a Skills Test.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
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