I applied online. The process took 4 weeks. I interviewed at Canonical (Taipei) in Jun 2022
Interview
After I submitted the application in their website, they sent me a series questions and ask me to compose a essay to answer it.
They said they expect you to spend 1-2 hours to finish it. While the most questions are quite general, like who's the competitors of Canonical? and how you think Canonical can win? something like that. And some questions are about how you were doing in College or High school. I am not a native speaker, so it took me much more time to finish it.
Then they sent you a Aptitude test. I don't think it's like a intelligent test, it's more like testing your speed of some specific kind of questions. Finally, I got their reject letter. I never encountered this kind of interview that interviewer turn you down without asking any technical question.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Are you involved in open source software?
Describe any significant contributions to open source (with links where possible), if any
What do you think are the key ingredients of a successful open source project?
Why do you most want to work for Canonical?
Which other companies are building the sort of products you would like to work on?
Which companies have the most interesting approach to devops and site reliability engineering?
What do you think could raise the bar for site reliability engineering, globally?
What do you think Canonical needs to improve in its engineering and products?
Who do you think are key competitors to Canonical? How do you think Canonical should plan to win that race?
Brutally long and difficult. They take their time so only apply if you have time and are dedicated to open source tech.
That being said they are very communicative so if you have any questions its not such a black box.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
They'll ask for specific niche aspects of coding languages to check if you actually use them day to day.
It's an extremely long process that includes standardized tests, take home assignments, and several rounds of interviews. It was at least 5 rounds long and you interview across different teams.
I applied through other source. I interviewed at Canonical (London, England)
Interview
They have a really long, tiring interview process. The first round was a written interview where I had to answer like 15 questions. Then a coding interview with 1 hour time that I could do anytime for 2 weeks. Then I had to take a personality test and they totally ghosted me.
Canonical interviews FAQs
Software Engineer applicants have rated the interview process at Canonical with 3.2 out of 5 (where 5 is the highest level of difficulty) and assessed their interview experience as 16% positive. To compare, the company-average is 14.9% positive. This is according to Glassdoor user ratings.
Candidates applying for Software Engineer roles take an average of 53 days to get hired, when considering 155 user submitted interviews for this role. To compare, the hiring process at Canonical overall takes an average of 51 days.
Common stages of the interview process at Canonical as a Software Engineer according to 155 Glassdoor interviews include:
Personality test: 19%
Skills test: 19%
IQ intelligence test: 17%
One on one interview: 16%
Phone interview: 12%
Other: 7%
Presentation: 3%
Background check: 3%
Group panel interview: 2%
Drug test: 1%
Here are the most commonly searched roles for interview reports -