Interview Experiences

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

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7 stories

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SnapchatSoftware EngineerSenior+
Aug 2026

LRU Cache and Thread Safety

Here is my Snap senior phone screen. It started immediately with behavioral questions. It looks like I still need to keep a few short stories ready in my regular preparation, since I have heard that the quality of the behavioral answers carries weight in the evaluation. The coding question was the classic LRU Cache problem. I had to be careful with the boundary cases while implementing it. The fo…

In progressTechnical Screen0
SnapchatSoftware Engineer
Aug 2026

Two Bugs, No Time, and a Rejection

The phone-screen question was LeetCode 947. I implemented it using breadth-first search. Near the end, my code still had two bugs. I found one of them myself, while the interviewer pointed out the other one. After that, I ran the test cases. By the time the tests were finished, there was no time left in the interview. I do not know whether the interviewer had prepared a follow-up question, becaus…

RejectedTechnical Screen0
SnapchatSoftware Engineer
Jul 2026

ML Infra Loop With Misleading Prep, No Offer

I interviewed for Snap SDE ML infra in September. Posting my rejection story as a reference for whoever comes after. Phone screen: an unusual problem, data stream processing. Every incoming data point can be stored into a stored cluster (you decide from the data itself whether it belongs to an existing cluster or is the first data point of a new cluster). You also have to implement a function tha…

RejectedOnsite0
SnapchatSoftware Engineer
Mar 2026

Failed on the Onsite's Third Round

I interviewed here earlier this year. Snap didn't seem to have any exact LeetCode-original questions, so I'm writing this mostly from memory. Round 1: You're given a list of timestamp events (unordered, can repeat), something like [12:00:01, 01:02:02, 03:03:03]. Implement a query function: given a start time and end time, compute how many events fall in that window. For example, [01:02:01, 01:02:…

RejectedOnsite0
SnapchatSoftware Engineer
Feb 2026

Five Onsite Rounds, Grilled Until Sweating

Locked — open it to unlock the full story with XP.

OnsiteXP0
SnapchatSoftware Engineer
Jan 2026

Five-Round Virtual Onsite, Auto-Rejected With No Reason

Sharing my feedback report for Snap from earlier this year. The virtual onsite had 5 rounds total — two coding, two system design, and one Q&A round where I could ask anything. The Q&A round interviewer told me that if I passed at least 3 of the previous 4 rounds, I'd move on to the discussion stage; with only 2 passes, I'd most likely be rejected. I felt like I did decently, but in the end I got…

RejectedOnsite0
SnapchatSoftware Engineer
Nov 2025

Implementing sin(x) by Hand on the Phone Screen

Phone interview with Snapchat. The interviewer was pretty good to talk to — the whole process went well, he gave hints promptly, and he was pretty chatty. I did so-so, I feel like I still need more practice, I stumbled a bit. It started with a self-introduction, then a behavioral question about how to make decisions when the information you have is limited — not hard if you prepare well. The tech…

In progressTechnical 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.

Share your experience to earn XP