I applied online. The process took 1 day. I interviewed at Optiver (Chicago, IL) in Sep 2024
Interview
3+ hour interview total. First part coding, second part knowledge check, third part games. Need 100% on coding to pass, mostly systems design. Familiarity and speed is important. Knowledge check was easy. The games I heard weren't as important for SWE.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
There was a coding question about shopping queues in a mall (?). You had to keep track of multiple queues, recording when people left the queue, when people dropped something off their bag in the middle of the queue, etc. You can process the queues either by moving each forward by one or processing a certain number of them in one queue (?) Essentially a systems design question involving multiple queues with some constraints. Not too bad but a bit lengthy.
Started with a technical OA where you got two questions to complete in ~ 2 hours, followed by a recruiter chat to get to know you better
Questions like why do you want to work at Optiver, what are you passionate about (talked about different investment strategies)
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
OA had two specific questions to Optiver,
One was on scheduling events subject to some constraint.
First round technical interview. Equal parts coding and classic system design. Chill interviewer, chatted a bit after the interview. Lots of emphasis on weighing the pros and cons of an approach.
I applied online. The process took 2 weeks. I interviewed at Optiver (Australia Plains) in Apr 2025
Interview
The coding part was easy, but the logical reasoning was confusing, as one couldn't say they were completely right. Questions seemed easy, but I couldn't complete the other on time, spent too much time perfecting the first one.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
2 OOPs based question one was on queue and other on stacks