Interview Experiences

Real candidates, real loops: every round, what was asked, and how it ended.

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25 stories

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InstacartSoftware EngineerSenior+
Sep 2026

Fast Coding and a Difficult Bar Raiser

The virtual onsite had two coding rounds, one design round, and one bar-raiser round. The coding questions were ones from interview reports, and easier than the versions on the forum. I breezed through both. For the calculate-expression question, the interviewer said in part two that there would always be spaces around the +, =, and - signs, so parsing was straightforward. In part three, the only…

RejectedOnsite0
InstacartSoftware Engineer
Sep 2026

Library OA, Pricing, and Inventory Design

I translated this passage into Chinese as follows: All the questions I received were exactly the same as those in another post. 0) OA: A full-stack CodeSignal repository test, with AI. A book/library management system. 1) Coding problem 1: The first problem was translating expressions (T1 = T4). 2) Coding problem 2: Calculate the total price of products in an array of strings, in the format sku|p…

Onsite0
InstacartSoftware Engineer
Aug 2026

L5 Interviews in Canada and Team Matching

It took almost a month after I applied for HR to reach out. I had almost thought I'd been rejected. The OA was the vibe-coding OA that people have been talking about a lot on the forum lately. After doing it myself, I felt that ten minutes to communicate with the AI product manager was nowhere near enough, unless I used speech-to-text input. Onsite 1: Calculate Equation Expression. Onsite 2: A re…

In progressOnsite0
InstacartAI Analytics Lead II
Aug 2026

An API Data-Ingestion Gap Ended the Process

There was no interview experience for this role on the forum, so I am sharing mine. From the job description, this role looks like an analytics engineer plus a product analyst. With the impact of AI, one person really can do all of this work. Process: After a friend referred me, the recruiter reached out. Online assessment: six or seven SQL questions, not hard. I passed. HM interview: the HM seem…

RejectedTechnical Screen0
InstacartSoftware Engineer
Aug 2026

Five-Round AI Online Assessment

I barely scraped by. As far as I can tell, there's currently only one question in the question bank — a library book search/borrowing system. There's already a very detailed writeup of this question in another post, so I'll just add a few of my own thoughts here: For round 1 and round 4, when talking to the AI PM, try to put all your questions into a single prompt and have the AI PM answer everyt…

In progressOnline Assessment0
InstacartSoftware Engineer
Jul 2026

A Single CodeSignal OA Question With Five Escalating Follow-ups

The first step was an OA on CodeSignal. There was a lot of identity verification along the way — anti-cheating checks. It was one question with multiple follow-ups, getting progressively harder. The OA email said you didn't need to finish everything, and honestly I don't think it's possible to finish it all — 90 minutes, 5 parts. The problem gave you template code. Implement account creation: cre…

In progressOnline Assessment0
InstacartData Scientist
Reported Jul 2026

Instacart Data Scientist interview: case study and SQL screen

One part of my process felt light technically for how long it took. After a recruiter-style step, I completed a live case study that lasted 1.5 hours. I used Python, or another tool of my choice, for the main technical task. The case study took up most of the time; I also gave a presentation and answered questions from people presented as stakeholders. In a separate recruiter-to-tech-screen path,…

Technical Screen0
InstacartSoftware Engineer
Jun 2026

Hit With a Brand-New Question, Failed on BQ

A totally new question I'd never seen before, and I was the one who got hit with it. I feel like every question in this loop had a pretty large amount of code, so everyone should practice a lot. I think I failed because of the new question and the BQ — I prepared for BQ the Amazon way, but in practice it felt more like a casual conversation, and I wasn't quite ready for that. Coding round: the cl…

RejectedOnsite0
InstacartBackend EngineerSenior+
Jun 2026

A CodeSignal OA Built Entirely Around Claude Code

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Online AssessmentPremium0
InstacartSoftware Engineer
May 2026

Karat Phone Screen, Rejected Two Weeks Later

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RejectedTechnical ScreenPremium0
InstacartBackend EngineerSenior+
May 2026

A 5-Part OA That Was Basically Vibe-Coding With Claude

I've compiled some tips I saw online and added my own experience. The deadline was two weeks. What surprised me was that this OA was completely different from the Instacart OAs I had seen discussed before. It was a 5-part assessment, and the overall format felt more like "AI-assisted full-stack feature implementation" than a traditional coding assessment. Time limit was 90 minutes. The assessment…

RejectedOnline Assessment0
InstacartSoftware Engineer
Feb 2026

An OA Question About Workers Nobody Had Seen Before

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In progressOnline AssessmentXP0
InstacartMachine Learning Engineer
Feb 2026

Passed Coding, Failed on One ML Concept Question

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RejectedTechnical ScreenXP0
InstacartData Scientist
Feb 2026

Product Sense, Experiment Design, and SQL in 45 Minutes

Overall the experience was good. The interviewer was very nice and the conversation flowed smoothly. In 45 minutes we covered product sense, experiment design, experiment analysis, and SQL. Question 1 How to investigate a metric decline. Pretty standard question. Seasonality, product changes, user segments, external competition — anything reasonable works. Question 2 If you were launching a new p…

Technical Screen0
InstacartSoftware EngineerSenior+
Jan 2026

OA, Two Coding Rounds, and a Karat AI Coding Round

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OnsiteXP0
InstacartSoftware Engineer II
Jan 2026

Four-Question OA With a Tricky Shape-Placement Puzzle

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Online AssessmentXP0
InstacartSoftware Engineer
Jan 2026

OA, Three Codings, and a Karat AI Round That Went Sideways

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RejectedOnsiteXP0
InstacartData ScientistSenior+
Dec 2025

Five Questions on Product Sense, Experiment Design, and SQL

Overall the experience was good. The interviewer was very nice, and communication was smooth. The 45 minutes covered product sense, experiment design, experiment analysis, and SQL. Question 1 How to investigate a metric decline. Pretty standard question. Seasonality, product changes, user segments, external competition — as long as it's reasonable, that's fine. Question 2 If you want to launch a…

Technical Screen0
InstacartData Scientist
Dec 2025

Four Rounds Including a Bar Raiser Case and a Project Presentation

Four rounds. Round 1 — Problem Solving (30 min): We partnered with a local grocery store to add a smart cart. Users could use the smart cart to find this store's own products and prices, and at the same time see products and prices from other stores on the Instacart app through the same cart. They asked whether this is a good idea, what the hypothesis would be, which metrics to look at, and how t…

Onsite0
InstacartSoftware Engineer
Oct 2025

VO Split Into VO1/VO2, Karat AI-Coding Round

I got hit with Instacart's VO reform. The onsite is now split into two parts, VO1 and VO2 — if you fail VO1, there's no VO2, that's just it. VO1 has three rounds: First, the Karat round, which is AI coding. I hadn't used AI tools in a while so I wasn't used to it, and I only got through the fourth question before time ran out. The questions were: Given a codebase on a bus route simulation: How do…

Onsite0

What are interview experiences?

An interview experience is a candidate's own account of a hiring loop — not a question bank entry. It tells you the shape of the process: how many rounds there were, what each round actually tested, how long the gaps between them ran, and what the recruiter said at the end. That context is the part a question list cannot give you.

How to read them

Weight recent write-ups more heavily — interview loops change, often within a year. Read several for the same company and role rather than one: a single account tells you what one interviewer asked, while five tell you what the bar is. Note the outcome badge too, since a rejection write-up usually explains the gap far more precisely than an offer one.

Share your own

Every published experience earns 50 XP, and each of the first 3 likes it receives in a day earns you 10 XP more. Likes must come from established accounts; like-for-like swaps and likes from your own second account are not paid. Write it while the details are fresh — the round order, the exact prompts, and how much time you were given are what the next reader needs.

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