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Software Engineer Interview Questions

Software engineers write programs to design and develop computer software. Interviews are highly technical, so come ready to work through coding problems and math brainteasers. The specific questions you are asked will depend on what type of programming position you are looking for. Try researching a specific software discipline such as web development, application development, or system development.

Top Software Engineer Interview Questions & How to Answer

Question 1

Question #1: How would you describe your programming task process?

How to answer
How to answer: When answering a question about your process or life cycle for software development and engineering, it's helpful to consider every step, beginning with obtaining the requirements for the end product. Include as much detail as possible to help the interviewer learn more about any work you've done as a software engineer and how you handle a task to show your ability to tackle a project from start to finish.
Question 2

Question #2: Which programming languages do you know and prefer?

How to answer
How to answer: An interviewer will want to know what programming languages you're familiar with, as well as which languages you prefer. This question doesn't necessarily have a right or wrong answer, but it does provide insights into your capabilities and coding expertise. If the job listing for which you are interviewing includes specific language knowledge preferences, make sure to include them when outlining the software languages you know.
Question 3

Question 3: What is an example of a successful project that you completed?

How to answer
How to answer: When describing your success with a past project, it's helpful to identify aspects of the project that went well and detail the different task list elements. You can describe the team with whom you worked on the project, how you managed your time, and how you specifically contributed to the project.

419,481 software engineer interview questions shared by candidates

Providing an algorithm for combinations(n, k), not because of it's complexity, just because it took my the majority of the interview to understand that this was the problem I was solving - it was not made very clear at all.
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Software Engineer

Interviewed at Meta

3.5★
Apr 3, 2013

Providing an algorithm for combinations(n, k), not because of it's complexity, just because it took my the majority of the interview to understand that this was the problem I was solving - it was not made very clear at all.

Given a 2D array of letters, return whether a given word can be found in the grid. To make a word, you can use any adjacent character next to the character you're currently on in the word. But you cannot use the same grid index twice i.e. in a 2x2 array, you could find a 4 letter word by visiting each letter once
avatar

Software Engineer(Internship)

Interviewed at Meta

3.5★
Nov 3, 2018

Given a 2D array of letters, return whether a given word can be found in the grid. To make a word, you can use any adjacent character next to the character you're currently on in the word. But you cannot use the same grid index twice i.e. in a 2x2 array, you could find a 4 letter word by visiting each letter once

5 bags, each bag has some balls. 1 bag has faulty balls. There are faulty balls weighing 1.1kg and good ones weighing 1kg. There is a weighing machine. Determine in how many measurements can you find the bag with faulty balls and which bag contains it.
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Systems Software Engineer

Interviewed at NVIDIA

4.6★
Feb 11, 2020

5 bags, each bag has some balls. 1 bag has faulty balls. There are faulty balls weighing 1.1kg and good ones weighing 1kg. There is a weighing machine. Determine in how many measurements can you find the bag with faulty balls and which bag contains it.

Given an array of integers, return true if there are contiguous numbers such that they add up to a specific target. For eg: [6,1,2,3,3,7] target sum is 8, will return true because 2,3,3 adds up to 8 and are contiguous. [6,1,2,4,3,3,7] will return false as there are no contiguous elements which adds up to 8.
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Software Engineer

Interviewed at Meta

3.5★
Jul 26, 2017

Given an array of integers, return true if there are contiguous numbers such that they add up to a specific target. For eg: [6,1,2,3,3,7] target sum is 8, will return true because 2,3,3 adds up to 8 and are contiguous. [6,1,2,4,3,3,7] will return false as there are no contiguous elements which adds up to 8.

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