I applied through college or university. The process took 3 weeks. I interviewed at Airbnb (San Francisco, CA) in Oct 2017
Interview
I got an invite from a recruiter to attend a network event, which led to a Hacker Rank challenge. Afterwards, I talked on the phone with an engineer for 15 minutes to go over my solution. Then, I was invited to do two technical Skype interviews. Finally, they flew me on-site for three interviews: 1 technical and 2 "cross functional" interviews. The cross functional interviews were largely cultural, i.e. would you be a good fit for Airbnb? The cross functional interviews are not necessarily conducted by other engineers. Overall, everything was super quick and the recruiters were really personable. The company made a really positive impression on me. Definitely look at the glass door posts below to prepare for interviews - they're very helpful.
Received an email from the recruiter with some helpful tips how to prepare. I have not been practicing leetcode questions but the one I got was easy... if it was in python (was not an option)
I applied online. The process took 3 weeks. I interviewed at Airbnb in Oct 2019
Interview
After the university Hackerrank test, I received an email in about a week to do a 90-minutes phone interview. The questions were moderately tough compared to other FAANGULTAD interviews.
The first interview went well and I was able to come up with a working solution within the given timeframe. The interviewer seemed to be satisfied with the solution and I proceeded to the second round. The second interview didn't go as expected though. The interviewer was nice but was inexperienced at interviewing candidates. I usually try to brainstorm a few ideas, discuss my solutions with the interviewer, and pick the best solution and code it up. However, whenever I verbally expressed my thought process, the interviewer intervened and asked if this is the best and tried to nudge me down towards his way of thinking. I really appreciate that he was trying to help, but not everyone's thought process works the same. I could've ultimately arrived at the same optimized solution but because the interviewer kept interrupting throughout my initial brainstorming stage, my thoughts got tangled up and did not perform too well. I was able to get to a working solution, but I think the second interviewer was dissatisfied that I couldn't think in his way immediately. I think Airbnb should train interviewers better to get the most out of their candidates.
I applied online. The process took 2 months. I interviewed at Airbnb (San Francisco, CA) in Dec 2018
Interview
Hacker rank -> virtual onsite -> onsite. They usually got back within a week of the interview. The technical questions varied a lot but were usually difficult. The office is really great!
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Talk about how your life relates to airbnb core values.