Software Engineer applicants have rated the interview process at TikTok with 3.5 out of 5 (where 5 is the highest level of difficulty) and assessed their interview experience as 30% positive. To compare, the company-average is 37.3% positive. This is according to Glassdoor user ratings.
Candidates applying for Software Engineer roles take an average of 23 days to get hired, when considering 449 user submitted interviews for this role. To compare, the hiring process at TikTok overall takes an average of 30 days.
Common stages of the interview process at TikTok as a Software Engineer according to 449 Glassdoor interviews include:
Skills test: 29%
One on one interview: 27%
Phone interview: 24%
Presentation: 5%
Background check: 5%
Other: 3%
Personality test: 3%
Drug test: 2%
IQ intelligence test: 1%
Group panel interview: 1%
Here are the most commonly searched roles for interview reports -
I applied through an employee referral. The process took 2 weeks. I interviewed at TikTok (San Jose, CA) in Mar 2024
Interview
We had a short discussion about my resume and then went through a coding interview. I was confident that I provided the best solution, but the interviewer insisted that his approach was more optimized. I even consulted with some genius friends, and they all agreed with me. However, the work-life balance at the company seems terrible based on the interview. The interview was scheduled for 1 pm, and the interviewer had just woken up because he worked from 9 am to 3 am the previous night. He had only been with TikTok for less than three months and was already responsible for interviewing candidates.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Simple introduction and one medium leetcode question
Tackling the coding round was intense, kicking off with a question about counting distinct island shapes in a grid. The second challenge involved maximizing a sum without using adjacent elements, which really tested my problem-solving skills. About two minutes in, it hit me — this was a problem I had practiced on prachub.com just days before. The final question required implementing stacks and calculating the streaming median. After the technical rounds and a brief behavioral interview, I received an offer, which I happily accepted.
I applied through a recruiter. I interviewed at TikTok
Interview
- recruiter asked me to speak in Chinese for latter half of screen
- 1st round was algo interview
- 2nd round was algo and system design
- didn't move forward after second round
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
- 1st round was simple 1D dp problem
- 2nd round was graph problem (Djikstra's) and ML system design
2 rounds coding a lot of background questions very strange behavior from interviewer camera was off and asked questions in mandarin, leetcode medium-hard and very very slow communication from recruiters based in asia for an english role