Interview Experiences

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

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12 stories

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UpstartSoftware Engineer
Jul 2026

Recalling All 5 Online Assessment Questions

All 5 real questions, fully recalled. Question 1: Sum of multiples of 3, 5, 7 less than a given number For example, if the given number is 12, the multiples of 3 below it are 3, 6, and 9; the multiples of 5 are 5 and 10; and the multiple of 7 is 7 — so sum = 3 + 6 + 9 + 5 + 10 + 7 = 40 (12 itself, although a multiple of 3, is not included). Note: the original post's formatting here was garbled (s…

Online Assessment0
UpstartSoftware Engineer
Jul 2026

Six OA Questions Buried in Walls of Text

Very easy, 6 questions. The biggest challenge was that most of the questions were way too long — it took more than 2 minutes just to read and understand each one, and if you didn't pass on the first try, debugging got really stressful. For example, the first question (8 minute time limit) opened with a long paragraph about someone in medieval times who wrote a manuscript... two minutes later... t…

Online Assessment0
UpstartData Scientist
Reported Jul 2026

Upstart Data Scientist interview: fast-paced statistics and probability questions

After the recruiter screen, I was told the hiring-manager interview would be a straightforward conversation with one technical question at the end. Instead, brief introductions led into deep theoretical statistics and difficult mental math. The interviewer moved extremely fast. When I was unsure or interpreted something differently, I didn't feel I received enough clarification to get back on tra…

HR Screen0
UpstartSoftware Engineer
May 2026

Byte Formatter and a Restaurant Capacity Simulation

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

Online AssessmentXP0
UpstartSoftware Engineer
Apr 2026

Three OA Questions, Stuck on a Grid-Search Timeout

There were three questions in total, and two of them hadn't shown up in any interview reports before. Given a list of coordinates (x, y), find the min x, min y, max_x - min_x, and max_y - min_y. The problem statement was basically: filter out (name, score) pairs where the score is above a threshold, keep everything below the threshold, then find the max score among what's left and return its name…

Online Assessment0
UpstartSoftware Engineer
Mar 2026

Four OA Problems, Not Enough Time

Time was way too tight, the problems were super long and wrapped in scenarios, so I spent forever just reading through them. I didn't pass all the test cases on questions 3 and 4, so I definitely failed this one. Let me vent for a second too. I was job hunting around this same time last year, and it clearly feels way harder this year. Can people actually get all 4 of these problems bug-free withi…

RejectedOnline Assessment0
UpstartData ScientistSenior+
Feb 2026

A Statistics-Heavy Hiring Manager Screen

In Q4 2024, a recruiter reached out to me on LinkedIn about a staff DS role at their company. After a short conversation, we scheduled a one-hour phone screen with the hiring manager (an ML Applications Director). After a brief self-introduction, we moved into the first part. He asked me to walk him through a project where I needed to measure impact but couldn't launch an experiment. I described…

In progressTechnical Screen0
UpstartData ScientistIntern
Dec 2025

Same Questions Recycled Between Rounds

Overall, the experience was pretty good. The HR person and the few interviewers I dealt with were all really supportive — nobody looked down on international candidates. There was no HR screen — I went straight into the first-round tech interview. The interviewer didn't even ask about my resume; we did a quick self-introduction and then went straight into the questions. The questions were: An ato…

OfferOnsite0
UpstartData Scientist
Nov 2025

One Tech Screen, a Two-Round Virtual Onsite, and an Offer a Week Later

Overall the experience was quite good — the HR person and the several interviewers I dealt with were all very supportive, and none of them looked down on international candidates. There was no HR screen; I went straight into the first technical round. The interviewer didn't ask about my resume at all at first — just had me do a quick self-introduction and then went straight into questions. The qu…

OfferOnsite0
UpstartData ScientistSenior+
Oct 2025

Two Interviews Years Apart, Same Clash With the Interviewer

I applied to this company years ago, right after graduation, and it felt like neither I nor the phone-screen interviewer were really into each other. Fast forward many years, and this time the HR screen and phone screen actually went well at first — but the virtual onsite took me right back to those days. I ran into another interviewer where, again, neither of us was really into the other. That s…

Onsite0
UpstartData Scientist
Oct 2025

SQL Screen Then a Four-Round Onsite Full of Case Studies

Three SQL questions, no need to actually run the query. There's a marketing table (by marketing_touch), and another one is a conversion table. The first question is to calculate avg count by month. The second is to find the last touch before conversion, by company (or by month, I don't quite remember). The third is: conversion and last touch both happened in some particular month, and how many co…

Onsite0
UpstartData ScientistSenior+
Dec 2024

A Hardcore Stats Screen With the Hiring Manager

In Q4 2024 a recruiter reached out to me on LinkedIn about a staff DS role at their company. After a quick chat we scheduled a one-hour screen with the Hiring Manager (the ML Applications Director). After a short self-introduction we got into the first part. He asked me to walk him through a project at work where I needed to measure impact but couldn't launch an experiment. I gave him the backgro…

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.

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