PracHub is the free DarkInterview alternative when your search spans 40 companies

For a single AI-lab loop, DarkInterview's $69 is worth it. For everything wider, start free. Here's where the

line actually falls.

(One key opens one door; a loaded ring opens forty. That's the whole argument between a narrow paid bank and a broad free one, before you pay for a single month.)

I cost a friend sixty-nine dollars and about two weeks of his life last year, and it was my fault, so let me save you the same one.

He was targeting Anthropic. I told him to buy DarkInterview. And honestly? For three weeks that was the best advice I had. So this isn't a hit piece. If anything I feel a bit defensive on DarkInterview's behalf, because it's good. It's just good at a narrower thing than most people searching for an alternative actually need.

So here's the answer to the thing you typed into Google, right up front: if DarkInterview doesn't cover your target company, or you just don't want a card on file to start, open PracHub. That's the recommendation. The interesting part is the word "if".

What you get for $69, and where it stops

DarkInterview curates verified questions for roughly fifteen companies, mostly the AI labs. OpenAI. Anthropic. xAI. It refreshes them on roughly a monthly cadence, which matters more than it sounds like, and I'll come back to that, because it's the one place they genuinely beat everyone. Past a free tier, it's subscription-only.

The free tier is solid, though. You get Blind 75, the original 75-problem LeetCode list that ex-Meta staff engineer Yangshun Tay put together, plus a code sandbox that runs 10+ languages and a system-design canvas you can actually draw on. I'd bookmark that whatever else you use.

And the standard advice for a hot-company loop is basically "find the most current, most specific question bank you can and grind it into the ground." For one lab, that advice is right. DarkInterview is that bank. The mistake, my mistake, is running a whole job search like it's one loop.

The month I paid for fifteen companies and interviewed at none

So, back to my friend. Anthropic material, current. Sandbox, clean. His system-design reps finally had a real canvas instead of a photo of a whiteboard. Three good weeks.

Then the Anthropic process stalled. They do that. And he did what anyone does when one process goes quiet, he started throwing applications everywhere. Meta. Apple. A couple of mid-size startups.

DarkInterview doesn't cover Meta. Doesn't cover Apple. On purpose. So the tight little bank that had been an asset was suddenly just a wall, and he's paying $69 a month for a tool that has nothing to say about four of his five live interviews.

That was on me. I optimised for the loop he had that week instead of the search he was actually running.

Breadth wins a search. Curation wins a single loop.

I had it backwards. And look, the money was the small part. One month, $69, whatever. The part that actually stung was the two weeks of reps he'd sunk into one company's format that his other four interviews did not care about even slightly.

A question without a solution is just a slower way to feel behind

The price tag hides something else, and it has nothing to do with coverage. A bank that hands you the question but not the solution is half a tool. Doesn't matter whose bank it is.

Boring example, the kind that still turns up in phone screens:

def two_sum(nums, target):            # find two indices whose values hit target

for i in range(len(nums)):        # walk every number

for j in range(i + 1, len(nums)):   # pair it with every number after it

if nums[i] + nums[j] == target:  # found the pair?

return [i, j]         # hand both back, but we checked way too much

O(n^2). on a big input this just times out. now what?

A raw question list drops you right here and wishes you luck. Knowing the question doesn't unstick you. Knowing the pattern does:

def two_sum(nums, target):            # same problem, better idea

seen = {}                         # every number we've passed, and where it was

for i, n in enumerate(nums):      # one walk, that's the whole trick

if target - n in seen:        # already seen the piece that completes n?

return [seen[target - n], i]  # yes: the old index, and this one

seen[n] = i                   # no: stash n, keep going

O(n). the inner loop just... evaporates.

That jump, brute force to the idiomatic fix, is the whole thing you're trying to buy. PracHub includes written solutions with its questions, so you watch the pattern shift instead of rediscovering it from scratch under a timer. Which, if you've done it, you know is a slow and miserable way to feel behind. That gap, between seeing the pattern and clawing for it, matters no matter whose tool you're using. Which brings me to the one place DarkInterview flat-out wins.

Okay, let me give DarkInterview its due

There's one situation where I'd tell you to pay DarkInterview and not think twice about it.

If your entire search is one AI lab, and the loop is soon, that roughly-monthly refresh is worth real money. The questions actually track what those specific labs are asking right now, and PracHub's breadth, by its nature, can't promise the same per-company freshness. Add the 30+ lesson system-design course, the Excalidraw canvas, code execution across 10+ languages in the browser. For that one job, it's the sharper tool. I mean that.

Why free and broad matters more often

But most searches aren't one lab. Mine wasn't. My friend's wasn't. Yours probably isn't either. So what does free and broad actually buy you? A few things, and they stack.

You read for free. DarkInterview is subscription-only past Blind 75, at $69 a month,$159 a quarter, or $299 a year. PracHub has a free tier where you actually read the company-tagged questions and their worked solutions, the guides too, and Premium sits at$21.99 a month, adding tools on top like AI mock feedback and extra practice modes. No card to start.

Then coverage, which is the whole reason you're here. 40+ companies, 9,168+ questions claimed, 5,621 of them tagged to specific companies, against DarkInterview's deliberate fifteen. And the depth per company is a different order entirely: Meta alone has 1,111 questions, Amazon 555, where DarkInterview's per-company banks live in the tens (Anthropic sits around 20 to 31 active). Neither is wrong. One's a search tool, one's a loop tool.

And roles, which is easy to miss. DarkInterview is coding and system design for AI labs. PracHub spans SWE, DS, ML, PM and SQL, with 583 ML questions, 225 ML system-design problems, and 74 written company guides you can read without paying a cent. If you're a data scientist or an ML engineer, a narrow AI-lab coding bank was never built for you in the first place.

(PracHub's company grid: 40+ question banks under one free login, sitting next to a curated shortlist of about fifteen. Use the real coverage screenshot from the product docs here.)

How to choose without wasting a month

Here's the rule I wish I'd used. Match the tool to your blast radius (the number of companies you're actually targeting).

One AI lab, and the loop is close? Pay DarkInterview for the month, grind the verified bank, use the canvas, cancel when the interview's done. Genuinely good use of $69.

Two or more places, or any of them Meta, Apple, or something DarkInterview just doesn't list? Start broad and free on PracHub, and don't put a card down until something makes you. Same answer if you need worked solutions instead of bare prompts, or you're prepping DS, ML, PM or SQL instead of pure coding. And whatever else you do, go open the free Blind 75 today. Whoever's it is.

(A screenshot-and-save cheat-sheet for the single call that sets your whole prep budget. Pin it somewhere before you open either tool or spend a dollar.)

That leaves one question: what's your blast radius, one lab, or forty open tabs? Once you know the answer, the PracHub are right there, free, to start on.