Netflix Senior Software Engineer Interview Questions & Reviews
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Updated May 4, 2012 – Interview questions and reviews posted anonymously by interview candidates.
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Difficulty Rating [?] Based on 18 ratings 
“Average” Interview
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Interview Experience [?] Based on 18 ratings
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| 1–10 of 18 Netflix Interviews | Sort by |
Senior Software Engineer at Netflix
Posted May 4, 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 Jun 2010 (took 1 week)
Applied online and few days later heard back from the recruiter. I had one phone screen with the hiring manager and then followed up with another phone screen with the director of the group.
Interview Questions
Other Details
I Applied Online and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Senior Software Engineer at Netflix
Posted Apr 25, 2012
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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 Apr 2012 in Los Gatos, CA (took 2 days)
Was contacted by the recruiter and talked to the hiring manager the call went well but was declined presumably because my previous experience was not a good fit for what that team was looking for at that time
Interview Questions
Other Details
The interview consisted of a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Senior Software Engineer at Netflix
Posted Mar 14, 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 Mar 2012 in Los Gatos, CA (took 2 days)
I should have read interviews here before I agreed to an in-person interview. I saw a Craigslist ad and sent in a resume, not really expecting to hear back. A Netflix recruiter called; I called back and spoke for 15 minutes. A few days later, I spoke to a Netflix HR/recruiter. Then, I had a 45-minute phone interview with an engineer who mostly talked about my resume and experiences without any technical questions. He told me that he was going to recommend me for an in-person interview and, a few days later, an in-person interview was arranged. During this time, lots of companies were doing interviews, even in-person interviews, but very few offers were being made. Companies were in shopping mode, not hiring mode.
I looked on Glassdoor and was dismayed that this in-person interview was probably going to be a stressful waste of time. But I reviewed the 100+ slides on the Netflix site about culture (which was interesting) and the slides on the Netflix business case.
I met with 2 engineers first for 45 minutes or so and we discussed my resume. They showed me a screenshot and asked me to describe how I'd code it up and what issues to consider. They asked my to code up a contains() function in JavaScript on the whiteboard which determines if one element contains another element. Then, they left and another engineer interviewed me for 45 minutes. He asked me to add the contains() function to all elements in the system (e.g. HTMLElement.prototype). He also asked me to write the HTML and CSS for a layout with a header, a content pane, a navigation pane and a footer (memorize this solution! this question is asked at lots of companies). I met the HR person for 45-minutes where we discussed Netflix culture (kind of). I brought up various concepts from the culture slide deck (I thought it was interesting) but she parroted back the concepts; maybe it wasn't interesting to her. Finally, I talked to the director where he asked what ideas or thoughts about the Netflix site I had and then we had a super, in-depth discussion about A/B testing on those ideas and thoughts.
Most everybody was nice and, for sure, everybody was respectful. But I got clues that Netflix wasn't hiring much and that they could even wait up to a year for the perfect candidate, possibly interviewing dozens of candidates. The HR person also made a big fuss about how Netflix hires people who are an exact fit so they won't hire and you shouldn't accept unless everybody is 100% sure that the job was a perfect fit for you. I think that they knew that I was a no-hire before the end of the interview cycle but they did wait a day to let me know. That was a nice thing to do. I asked about reapplying but, frankly, don't think that I'll ever do that.
Interview Questions
Other Details
I Applied Online and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview, a 1:1 Interview and a Group/Panel Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Senior Software Engineer at Netflix
Posted Nov 27, 2011
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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 Mar 2011 in Los Altos, CA (took 3 weeks)
I applied online for a software engineering position at Netflix and received an invitation from a recruiter to interview for the position. After a brief phone screen, I was brought onsite to interview for about 4 hours with 5 people. These interviews were very technical and somewhat intense, but fair. They're very upfront about the high-performance culture and expectations at Netflix (see the deck on their website for more details), which I appreciated.
Following the first onsite interview, I was asked to come in again for another half day of interviews. These interviews were less technical and more about (1) the culture and organization of the work environment that I was coming from, and (2) whether or not I was a cultural fit for the company. I'd advise anyone who aspires to work at Netflix to think carefully about how you will answer these types of questions.
I'd thought that both days of onsite interviews went well, and so I was surprised a couple of days later to hear that they'd decided to pass on making me an offer. I was disappointed, as I'd have liked to have worked there at the time. However, with everything that's happened with their handling of price increases and licensing issues over this past year, not getting the job turned out to be a blessing in disguise.
I did feel that the recruiting process was very fast-paced and organized, more so than some other companies with whom I'd interviewed.
Interview Questions
Other Details
I Applied Online and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview and a 1:1 Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Senior Software Engineer at Netflix
Posted Sep 19, 2011
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3.0
Average Interview
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Overall Negative Experience
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Received and Declined Offer
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Interviewed Mar 2011 (took 3 weeks)
Three phone interviews - 1 from hiring manager, one from a software engineer, VP
1 day, 3 hour F2F interview: recruiter, 2 engineers, hiring manager, director
1 day, 3 hour F2F interview: director of eng, VP, HR
Make you jump through hurdles as if this is the best company in the world...
Engineers try to talk you out of the cutthroat culture and say just deliver on your projects. Overall feeling that everyone is working hard to survive. High salary offer about 30-50% of what you currently make. choice of dividing $$$ in salary and/or stocks. Interviews test your skill set and try to find out if there is a personality issue.
Interview Questions
Reason for Declining
In the end, I told them "It wasn't a good fit for me" and left it as is. They are pretty arrogant telling me that no one declines their offer based on compensation. It's as if they are the elite club in the Silicon Valley. Well, looks like the stocks are doing too well having it decline over 50% in the last few months. I'm glad I didn't accept as I see myself bailing out now before it's too late. Go at your own risk!
Other Details
The interview consisted of a Phone Interview, a 1:1 Interview and a Skills Test.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Senior Software Engineer at Netflix
Posted Sep 19, 2011
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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 Sep 2011 in Los Gatos, CA (took 3 weeks)
Applied on the website. A recruiter called. First telephonic with the hiring manager. Simple linked list/tree coding question with screen shared. Another telephonic interview where the Architect dug deep. Asked concepts on Java, Multithreading, Design Patterns etc. If you do your homework, they should be ok to crack.
Interview Questions
Reason for Declining
Overall, the negative feedback on glassdoor made it easy for me to ignore this offer. Even though they pay pretty neat, but I felt I can be happy at other place.
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?
Senior Software Engineer at Netflix
Posted Sep 16, 2011
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2.0
Easy Interview
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Overall Neutral Experience
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Interviewed and No Offer
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Interviewed Aug 2011 in Los Gatos, CA (took 2 weeks)
After the initial discussion I had an interview over the phone. The engineer over the phone asked questions about my resume and a few design questions. I was informed after 2 days that they want me to come for an in-person interview.
I was surprised to see how many people were there for interview at the same time I was invited. It was a mini job fair :). I had inteview with directors, engineers and HR. I must confess I was not grilled either by HR or engineers. They asked things about my resume, what is the toughest project you have worked on, how I feel about their culture etc. I was only posed only one technical problem.
I was informed later that it didn't work out for me. The group I was interviewing with handled all the communication very nicely. My only regret is that they rejected me without testing my technical skills.
Interview Questions
Other Details
The interview consisted of a Phone Interview and a 1:1 Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Senior Software Engineer at Netflix
Posted Sep 8, 2011 — 1 of 1 people found this helpful
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2.0
Easy Interview
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Overall Neutral Experience
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Received and Declined Offer
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Interviewed Aug 2011 (took 4 weeks)
Very weired interview from HR....
Engineer interview is normal, the question is no difficult compare with GOOG, Amazon, Microsoft
Interview Questions
algorithm and coding
Reason for Declining
The rise my pay 30% but no enough to make me move, and I do not really like their culture
Other Details
I Applied Online and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview, a 1:1 Interview and a Skills Test.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
View Comments (1)
Inappropriate?
Senior Software Engineer at Netflix
Posted Jul 9, 2011
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4.0
Difficult Interview
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Overall Positive Experience
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Received and Declined Offer
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Interviewed Feb 2009 in Los Gatos, CA (took 2+ weeks)
I had an initial phone interview which consisted of several questions on Java and Perl.
I then had an onsite interview and since i was an out-of-area candidate, i was given excellent accomodation for staying.
Onsite interviews included face to face interview with the tech lead, manager, VP etc
Most of the interviews were based on big scale data questions.
Interview Questions
Other Details
I got the interview through an Employee Referral and the interview consisted of a 1:1 Interview and a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Senior Software Engineer at Netflix
Posted Jun 20, 2011
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1.0
Very Easy Interview
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Overall Neutral Experience
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Received and Declined Offer
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Interviewed Jun 2011 in Los Gatos, CA (took 3 days)
30 min phone screen. few basic CS fundamentals. called for onsite with 5 people. Interview was peace of cake.
Interview Questions
Reason for Declining
Not sure why everyone says Netflix has great engineer. Team interviewed me seem not that good. and i don't feel like working in that team
Other Details
I got the interview through a Recruiter and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview and a 1:1 Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
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