Twitter Software Engineer Interview Questions & Reviews
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Updated May 22, 2012 – Interview questions and reviews posted anonymously by interview candidates.
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Difficulty Rating [?] Based on 16 ratings 
“Average” Interview
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Interview Experience [?] Based on 16 ratings
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| 1–10 of 16 Twitter Interviews | Sort by |
Software Engineer at Twitter
Posted May 22, 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 Mar 2012 in San Francisco, CA (took a day)
Most of the interviewers were great, asking awesome questions, sharing their experiences at the company. The last interviewer, however, was super bad, asking to write code on the whiteboard that consisted of detailed implementation in C++ (which I don't use for my job), recursive solution (which is usually not used on handheld devices that I code for a living), and excrutiating amount of unneeded details that she demanded was written through for the very specific problem she presented.
She was full of arrogance... Just like their CEO, whom I got to see in the cafeteria talking to my host, but who didn't even look my way (or made any effort to be... oh... a good host, at least).
Interview Questions
Other Details
I got the interview through a Recruiter and the interview consisted of a 1:1 Interview and a Group/Panel Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Twitter
Posted May 19, 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 Apr 2012 in San Francisco, CA (took 2 months)
I was referred by a friend and the recruiter got in touch with me around 2 weeks later. This was sometime in the middle of March 2012. He scheduled a phone interview for me a week later after which he informed me he would be scheduling 2 more phone screens and asked me for convenient times.
I didn't hear from him for around 6 weeks after that. I had mailed him in the interim asking for updates, but received no response and I assumed for some reason the first phone screen didn't go well (which was surprising as it was a pretty straightforward interview which I thought I did pretty well)
One fine day around the end of April, I receive a mail from the recruiter apologizing for the delay but not offering a reason. We agreed on dates for the 2 remaining phone screens which again went pretty well.
He then asks me if I can fly down to San Francisco (I am based out of Bangalore) which I said I would be glad to but ask if I can take a few rounds over skype to speed up the process. He ended up scheduling 4 rounds over skype. After the interviews, he informs me that the feedback was positive and he would set up another round with an Engineering manager. My internet connection had some issues during the call with the Manager but I am confident I was able to answer the single design question he ask me. After the interview, I had a couple of questions to ask but he complained that my voice was breaking up and he thanked me for my time and ended the interview.
I was really shocked when the recruiter calls me up the next day and informs me that the Manager "did not find me a good fit". I was pretty upset as he had mentioned to me earlier that all the other round were really positive. In retrospect, It did feel as if the manager has decided to decline the offer before the interview was complete.
Interview Questions
Output : (*, *, *), (*, *, c), (*, b, *), (*, b, c), (a, *, *), (a, *, c), (a, b, *), (a, b, c)
Other Details
I got the interview through an Employee Referral and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview and a 1:1 Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Twitter
Posted May 7, 2012
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1.0
Very Easy Interview
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Overall Negative Experience
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Interviewed and No Offer
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Interviewed Mar 2012 (took 4 weeks)
The interview consisted of two technical phone rounds. It wasn't a good experience from the start. I get it, they are Twitter and they pride themselves for being in a position they are right now. It doesn't mean they should disrespect an interviewee.
It took almost 6 weeks for the HR to schedule 2 rounds of phone interviews. Once in a while I had to check with the HR about the status of my application. It was frustrating.
Interview questions were fairly simple.
1. Reverse words in a given string.
2. Removing certain characters from an Array (don't remember the exact question)
First round was a good experience. He was respectful and asked standard interview questions. Second round was a disaster. Instead of evaluating my skill-set, he was focused on proving how good he is. Though the questions were simple, the attitude of the interviewer was really bad.
Overall a bad experience sparing that one phone round.
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 Twitter
Posted Apr 8, 2012 — 3 of 3 people found this helpful
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3.0
Average Interview
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Overall Positive Experience
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Received and Accepted Offer
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Interviewed Apr 2012 in San Francisco, CA (took 3 weeks)
I was referred by a friend. The recruiter contacted me shortly, asked why Twitter, what I would like to work on and if I had any time constraints.
I was shortly scheduled 2 phone interviews consisting both on talking about my projects and interests and also CS problems, writing code online. Both interviews allowed time for any questions and short discussions afterwards.
Then I had 6 on-site interviews with back-end people (that's what I opted for). They mostly consisted of whiteboard coding and some let me write on the computer. Some were CS questions some architectural and backend.
I recommend preparing for it, read about algorithms and be confortable writing code both online (though just a text editor - no feedback) and on a whiteboard. Depending on what you are applying for be prepared for architectural / design questions too.
Overall everybody was really nice and have a very positive perception. I got to ask about some of their challenges and discuss their solutions.
Interview Questions
Negotiation Details
The offer was very good and didn't need any negotiation.
Other Details
I got the interview through an Employee Referral and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview and a 1:1 Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
View Comments (5)
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Twitter
Posted Apr 12, 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 Jan 2012 in New York, NY (took 2 weeks)
Submitted the resume through twitter careers website. HR got in touch to schedule a 45 minute interview. Was asked to write code on collabedit. The question was to find the subtree with maximum number of files given a filesystem tree. The interviewer clarified that directories need not be counted as a file. The interviewer also gave system call APIs (that he had made up) that should be used to access the filesystem. I provided him a recursive solution coded in C++.
Interview Questions
Other Details
The interview consisted of a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Twitter
Posted Apr 4, 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 Sep 2011 (took a day)
Chatted very quickly with an engineer about past projects, then got quickly thrown a string manipulation question that was modified to be harder after finishing each part. There was time for questions afterwards as well, and the interviewer was open with answers.
If you're going to interview prepare and get ready! Twitter must get so many applications that they don't have time to invest in candidates that can't breeze through the phone screen without fumbling at all.
Interview Questions
Other Details
I Applied Online and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Twitter
Posted Mar 29, 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 Nov 2011 (took a day)
My college recruiter had a copy of resume on my file. After the big college employment conference I received a phone call due to my software and technical capabilities. It was a short, 15-minute interview process.
Interview Questions
Other Details
I got the interview through a College or University and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Twitter
Posted Mar 10, 2012
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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 Feb 2012 (took 2 weeks)
I was told to write a scpy function. The input and output are defined as I want
Interview Questions
Other Details
The interview consisted of a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Twitter
Posted Jan 2, 2012 — 2 of 2 people found this helpful
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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 Dec 2011 (took 2 weeks)
I was contacted by an internal recruiter and agreed to interview. A phone interview was set up by another person, where all of my personal information was incorrect, so I had to confirm my details. This was a Skype interview. After I passed the first round, another phone interview round was scheduled, where again, my personal information was incorrect, so I had to confirm again. This round was also supposed to be over Skype, but the interviewer called me on the phone instead. Both rounds had fairly easy questions with collaborative coding on the web. I knew I didn't make it after the second round, but haven't heard back from the recruiter after that.
Overall, the interviews themselves were fair, but the organization was just absolutely terrible.
Interview Questions
Other Details
The interview consisted of a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
Software Engineer at Twitter
Posted Dec 30, 2011
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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 in San Francisco, CA (took a day)
One technical interview, asked me a tree related problem, not solving the problem quickly enough, failed..
Interview Questions
Other Details
I Applied Online and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview.
Helpful Interview?
Yes |
No
Inappropriate?
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