Meta Interview Questions

Meta System Design Interview Questions

Practice 1,159 real Meta interview questions for 2026. Covers top categories — Coding & Algorithms, Analytics & Experimentation, Data Manipulation (SQL/Python), Behavioral & Leadership, and System Design — across Software Engineer, Data Scientist, Machine Learning Engineer, Data Engineer, and Product Manager roles. Real questions from actual interviews with detailed solutions. Expect a software-engineering-heavy loop: timed algorithmic coding (trees, arrays, graph/maze problems, delimiter/CSV parsing), system-design prompts like leaderboards, flight search and online-judge architectures, and an increasingly common AI-assisted coding round that mirrors real workflows. Data Scientist rounds emphasize product analytics and experimentation—designing tests, diagnosing spend drops and bots, evaluating unconnected content, and writing SQL for multi-account, seller, and vehicle metrics. Machine Learning Engineer questions skew toward recommender and ranking work (place and friend recommendation, sparse-matrix ops, linear-regression derivations, newsfeed dislike models). Data Engineers focus on data modeling, ETL, capacity calculations, reservations/utilization queries, and production SQL/Python tasks. For interview preparation, prioritize timed coding practice, system-design templates, rigorous SQL drills (joins/CTEs/aggregation), clear A/B-testing frameworks, and concise STAR behavioral stories tied to measurable impact.

1.2k Questions 1 Company07.06.2026
Showing 20 results
Role
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Meta
Medium
Data Scientist

Evaluating the Impact of Duplicate and Stolen Posts on a Content Platform

Evaluating the Impact of Duplicate and Stolen Posts on a Content Platform You are a data scientist at a large user-generated-content platform (think a...

Analytics & Experimentation
0
0
9 people solved
Feb 1, 2026
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Meta
Medium
Software Engineer

Compute interval mode, BST range sum, exclusive time

You are given several independent coding tasks. A) Most frequent integer covered by intervals You are given an integer range [-M, M] and a list of inc...

Coding & Algorithms
2
0
38 people solved
Oct 2, 2025
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Meta
Medium
Software Engineer

Design a real-time ad impression aggregator

Design an ads impression aggregator service with the following requirements: - The system ingests a high-volume stream of impression events (each even...

System Design
3
0
32 people solved
Oct 2, 2025
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Meta
Medium
Software Engineer

Solve sliding window and tree BFS

Solve sliding window and tree BFS Solve a typical medium-level sliding-window problem (e.g., longest substring without repeating characters). LeetCode...

Coding & Algorithms
5
0
51 people solved
Aug 4, 2025
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Meta
Medium
Software Engineer

Debug and optimize React performance issues

Debug and optimize React performance issues React Debugging and Performance Assessment Background You're reviewing a React single-page application dur...

System Design
4
0
48 people solved
Aug 4, 2025
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Meta
Easy
Data Scientist

Calculate Posterior Fraud Probability Using Bayes' Theorem

Calculate Posterior Fraud Probability Using Bayes' Theorem Posterior Fraud Probability After a Flag Context You operate a fraud detection system that ...

Statistics & Math
19
0
87 people solved
Aug 4, 2025
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Meta
Medium
Data Scientist

Describe Handling Conflict in Team Projects and Collaboration

Describe Handling Conflict in Team Projects and Collaboration Behavioral & Leadership (Onsite) — Data Scientist Scenario You are interviewing for a Da...

Behavioral & Leadership
89
0
231 people solved
Aug 4, 2025
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Meta
Medium
Data Scientist

Evaluate Fake-Account Classifier with Precision and Recall Metrics

Evaluate Fake-Account Classifier with Precision and Recall Metrics Evaluating a Fake-Account Classifier in Production Scenario You have trained a mode...

Machine Learning
6
0
48 people solved
Aug 4, 2025
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Meta
Medium
Data Scientist

Explain Statistical Concepts in A/B Testing and Corrections

Explain Statistical Concepts in A/B Testing and Corrections A/B Testing: p-values, Power, and Error Rates with Multiple Comparisons Context You are re...

Statistics & Math
4
0
31 people solved
Aug 4, 2025
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Meta
Medium
Software EngineerSenior+ Locked

Solve string transform and min-move sorting

This two-part problem evaluates string manipulation and algorithmic problem-solving competencies, specifically rule-based text transformation and comp...

Coding & Algorithms
6
0
99 people solved
Jan 22, 2026
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Meta
Medium
Machine Learning EngineerSenior+ Locked

Deep copy a linked list with random pointers

This question evaluates understanding of linked-list structures, pointer/reference manipulation, deep versus shallow copying, and the ability to analy...

Coding & Algorithms
4
0
69 people solved
Jan 22, 2026
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Meta
Medium
Machine Learning EngineerSenior+ Locked

Design a weapon-ad harmful content detection system

This question evaluates skills in end-to-end system design and applied machine learning for multi-modal harmful content detection, covering scalabilit...

System Design
6
0
69 people solved
Jan 22, 2026
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Meta
Medium
Machine Learning Engineer Locked

Implement LRU cache and copy random list

This question evaluates competency in data-structure design, pointer and memory management, and hashing-based eviction policies by combining a deep-co...

Coding & Algorithms
6
0
47 people solved
Jan 21, 2026
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Meta
Medium
Software Engineer Locked

Design coding platform with global leaderboard

This question evaluates proficiency in scalable distributed systems and system design, including real-time ranking algorithms, data modeling, API desi...

System Design
6
0
57 people solved
Jan 18, 2026
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Meta
Hard
Software Engineer AI Locked

Implement a Timestamped Banking System

This question evaluates the ability to design and implement an in-memory, time-ordered stateful system handling event scheduling, transactional update...

Coding & Algorithms
3
0
35 people solved
Apr 8, 2026
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Meta
Medium
Data Scientist

Explore Behavioral Growth and Adaptability in Data Science.

Behavioral Deep-Dive: Growth, Agility, Cross-Team Support, and Inclusion You are in a behavioral and leadership round for a Data Scientist role. The i...

Behavioral & Leadership
113
0
384 people solved
Jul 12, 2025
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Meta
Medium
Data Scientist

Evaluating and launching Instagram Stories

Evaluating and Launching Instagram Stories You are evaluating the rollout and impact of Stories, an ephemeral sharing format similar to Snapchat, acro...

Analytics & Experimentation
73
1
269 people solved
Jul 12, 2025
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Meta
Medium
Data Scientist Locked

Fake Accounts [AE]

Evaluates probability, classification metrics, and feature engineering for fake-account detection. Strong answers apply Bayes' rule with rate-weighted...

Statistics & Math
216
6
492 people solved
Jul 12, 2025
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Meta
Medium
Data Scientist

Determine Features for Effective Hashtag Recommendations

Hashtag Recommendation System Design You are designing a hashtag recommendation system for a social-media platform. Given a user composing post conten...

Machine Learning
105
1
279 people solved
Jul 12, 2025
Meta logo
Meta
Hard
Data Scientist

Track Success and Guardrail Metrics for Push Notifications

Track Success and Guardrail Metrics for Push Notifications You are designing and evaluating a new push-notification feature for a travel-recommendatio...

Analytics & Experimentation
93
0
378 people solved
Jul 12, 2025

Frequently Asked Questions

How difficult are Meta interview questions?
Meta interview questions span a wide difficulty range because they must screen candidates from entry to senior levels across many functions. Expect coding rounds to map to medium-to-hard algorithmic problems that appear in top 100 problem lists for software engineers, and expect data roles to face challenging SQL, experiment diagnosis, and product-analytics problems that require clean metric definitions. Machine learning roles emphasize recommendation and ranking tradeoffs and model complexity, while data engineers encounter large-scale ETL and modeling puzzles. Difficulty scales with level: entry hires see clearer, bounded problems; senior hires face ambiguous tradeoffs and system-wide thinking.
What is Meta's interview process and where do these questions appear?
Meta typically runs a multi-stage process: recruiter screen, one or two technical screens or an online assessment, a full loop of onsite-style interviews, then debrief, committee review, and offer. The full loop mixes coding, system or product design, role-specific technical rounds, and behavioral interviews. Software-engineer candidates spend most time on coding and design; data scientists focus on SQL, experimentation, and product analytics; machine-learning engineers see modeling and recommendation design; data engineers handle SQL, data modeling, and pipeline questions; PMs get product-design and analytics probes. In 2025–2026 some teams pilot AI-enabled coding rounds.
How should I structure a preparation timeline for a Meta interview?
A focused six-week plan works well: weeks one and two cover fundamentals—data structures, algorithms, SQL basics, and experiment design; weeks three and four emphasize timed problem practice, mock phone screens, and role-specific cases (A/B diagnosis for data scientists, model design for MLEs, ETL modeling for data engineers); week five concentrates on system or product design and behavioral storytelling; week six is for full mock loops, timing, and refining communication. Practice with realistic tools, simulate loop pacing, and schedule a debrief after each mock to iterate on clarity, edge-case handling, and time management.
Which technical subtopics are most commonly tested for each role at Meta?
For Data Scientist interviews the recurring technical themes are product-metric definition, diagnosing experiment and spend drops, counting multi-account interactions, SQL for multi-entity metrics, and ranking or recommendation evaluation such as shop ad ranking. Software-engineer questions frequently focus on timestamped state and versioned systems, leaderboards and ranking, maze/graph traversal and tree/array transforms, delimiter and CSV parsing, and scalable search or flight-search style designs. Machine-learning engineers see place and friend recommendation design, sparse-matrix operations, ranking/loss choices, and feed dislike or personalization models. Data engineers repeatedly face entity modeling for feed and booking data, SQL analytics for utilization and reservations, and capacity-aware aggregation challenges.
What standout tips and common pitfalls should I watch for in Meta interviews?
Start interviews by clarifying requirements and expected outputs, then propose measurable success metrics; this prevents misaligned solutions. For coding, think aloud, handle edge cases, state complexity up front, and write a couple of quick tests. In design rounds quantify load, storage, and tradeoffs rather than vague features. Data roles must define metrics, guardrails, and experiment assumptions before jumping to analysis; common pitfalls are ambiguous metric definitions, peeking at tests, and ignoring instrumentation limits. For AI-assisted coding rounds, use the assistant to accelerate boilerplate but validate logic and corner cases yourself. Finish each answer with a concise summary of impact and tradeoffs.

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