Interview Experiences

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

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30 stories

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RipplingSoftware Engineer
Mar 2026

How I Used AI-Enabled Coding in the Onsite

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OnsiteXP0
RipplingSoftware EngineerSenior+
Mar 2026

An 11-Minute Late Start, a Chaotic Round, and a Recruiter Swap

The interviewer was 11 minutes late. I was actually about to just leave the call and email the recruiter to say they were a no-show, but they showed up at the very last moment. After joining, there was no intro or behavioral portion at all — they went straight into technical. Right off the bat they asked whether I wanted an AI or non-AI technical round, and I picked non-AI. Then the interviewer j…

RejectedTechnical Screen0
RipplingSoftware Engineer
Feb 2026

Designing a Rule Engine for Corporate Card Spend Limits

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Technical ScreenXP0
RipplingSoftware Engineer
Feb 2026

Rough System Design Round, Strong Manager Round, Then Rejected

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RejectedOnsiteXP0
RipplingSoftware Engineer
Jan 2026

Extensible Five-Card Poker Evaluation

Write a simplified version of Texas Hold'em. Given two five-card hands, compare them and determine the winner. The design needed to use object-oriented principles, pay attention to code style, and be extensible. Game Rules Goal: Compare two five-card hands, hand_1 and hand_2, and determine the winner. Card values: 9 is the highest value and 1 is the lowest. There are no letter cards such as ace,…

Technical Screen0
RipplingSoftware Engineer
Jan 2026

A Poker OOD Question I Didn't Practice For

Just finished a fresh Rippling phone screen, so let me write it up while it's still fresh. The question was an OOD problem based on a poker game — I pasted the full prompt below. Going into this interview I mainly grinded Delivery Cost System and Expense Rules System OOD. I did see this Poker question when I was collecting interview reports beforehand, but I only skimmed through the approach once…

Technical Screen0
RipplingSoftware Engineer
Dec 2025

A Combative System Design Onsite Over Hotel Booking

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OnsiteXP0
RipplingSoftware Engineer
Dec 2025

Onsite System Design on a Metrics Monitoring System, Passed

Unlike what I've seen in other write-ups on the forums, I don't know if they changed the question or if there are now two system design question pools for the onsite (Google News / a metrics monitoring system) — I got the monitoring system one. The gist was: collect some user behavior data, like installs / user clicks / etc, and it needed both a real-time view and collection of raw events for a b…

OfferOnsite0
RipplingSoftware Engineer
Sep 2025

Missing the One Case the Forum's Writeup Left Out

It's the courier question that's already up on the forum, and the forum write-up was already very detailed! But there's one thing it left out: the same dasher can take multiple orders at the same time. When I was practicing beforehand I hadn't considered that case, and I hadn't seen it mentioned on the forum either, so when the third, concurrent follow-up came out, I had to think about it for a b…

In progressTechnical Screen0
RipplingSoftware Engineer
Sep 2025

Coding a Reimbursement System With Group Limits

The interviewer said the question was the same as what's already on the forums — build an expense reimbursement system that can freely apply different approval rules to decide whether someone's submitted expense meets the requirements and can be paid out. I also got to the second part of the question: after you've built a reimbursement approval system, can you further group reimbursements by some…

Technical Screen0

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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