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Software Engineer Interview Questions

Software engineers write programs to design and develop computer software. Interviews are highly technical, so come ready to work through coding problems and math brainteasers. The specific questions you are asked will depend on what type of programming position you are looking for. Try researching a specific software discipline such as web development, application development, or system development.

Top Software Engineer Interview Questions & How to Answer

Question 1

Question #1: How would you describe your programming task process?

How to answer
How to answer: When answering a question about your process or life cycle for software development and engineering, it's helpful to consider every step, beginning with obtaining the requirements for the end product. Include as much detail as possible to help the interviewer learn more about any work you've done as a software engineer and how you handle a task to show your ability to tackle a project from start to finish.
Question 2

Question #2: Which programming languages do you know and prefer?

How to answer
How to answer: An interviewer will want to know what programming languages you're familiar with, as well as which languages you prefer. This question doesn't necessarily have a right or wrong answer, but it does provide insights into your capabilities and coding expertise. If the job listing for which you are interviewing includes specific language knowledge preferences, make sure to include them when outlining the software languages you know.
Question 3

Question 3: What is an example of a successful project that you completed?

How to answer
How to answer: When describing your success with a past project, it's helpful to identify aspects of the project that went well and detail the different task list elements. You can describe the team with whom you worked on the project, how you managed your time, and how you specifically contributed to the project.

419,197 software engineer interview questions shared by candidates

given an arrya of numbers see if you can get to index with 0 in it from an index by jumping through the array using the values in the array. So if you have [1,2,1,0,3] you can get to 0, from 0 by jumping 0, you can get to 0 from 3, by jumping 3 index down to 2 and then jumping 2 index up to 0...
avatar

Software Engineer

Interviewed at Pinterest

3.6★
Nov 19, 2012

given an arrya of numbers see if you can get to index with 0 in it from an index by jumping through the array using the values in the array. So if you have [1,2,1,0,3] you can get to 0, from 0 by jumping 0, you can get to 0 from 3, by jumping 3 index down to 2 and then jumping 2 index up to 0...

Given a binary tree, which is not necessarily balanced, print the nodes in the tree in a level-wise manner. Also, nodes on the same level should be printed on a single line. A modification of the question was added later in which I cannot really add a "level" variable in the structure of the node in the tree.
avatar

Software Engineer Intern

Interviewed at Meta

3.5★
Aug 13, 2013

Given a binary tree, which is not necessarily balanced, print the nodes in the tree in a level-wise manner. Also, nodes on the same level should be printed on a single line. A modification of the question was added later in which I cannot really add a "level" variable in the structure of the node in the tree.

Implement a method called printNonComments() which prints out a extract of text with comments removed. For example, the input: hello /* this is a multi line comment */ all Should produce: hello all You have access to a method called getNextLine() which returns the next line in the input string.
avatar

Senior Software Engineer

Interviewed at Meta

3.5★
Jun 30, 2014

Implement a method called printNonComments() which prints out a extract of text with comments removed. For example, the input: hello /* this is a multi line comment */ all Should produce: hello all You have access to a method called getNextLine() which returns the next line in the input string.

1. Tell me about yourself 2. Given each abc letter has a value (a=1, b=2, ... , z=26), compute the number of ways one can decode a given integer. e.g. 23 --> 2 [ 2, 3 ; 23 ], 456 --> 1 [ 4, 5, 6 ], 123 --> 3 [ 1, 2, 3 ; 1, 23 ; 12, 3 ]
avatar

Software Engineer

Interviewed at Meta

3.5★
Feb 23, 2015

1. Tell me about yourself 2. Given each abc letter has a value (a=1, b=2, ... , z=26), compute the number of ways one can decode a given integer. e.g. 23 --> 2 [ 2, 3 ; 23 ], 456 --> 1 [ 4, 5, 6 ], 123 --> 3 [ 1, 2, 3 ; 1, 23 ; 12, 3 ]

(Phone screen questions) 1. For a given binary tree, print paths from root to all leaf nodes, one path per line. 2. Given a sequence of positive integers "seq" and an integer "total", return whether a contiguous sequence of "seq" sums up to "total". (Onsite interview questions are covered by NDA therefore can't post, but it can be said that the knowledge of data structures and handling edge cases are important for the coding interviews)
avatar

Software Engineer

Interviewed at Meta

3.5★
Apr 1, 2019

(Phone screen questions) 1. For a given binary tree, print paths from root to all leaf nodes, one path per line. 2. Given a sequence of positive integers "seq" and an integer "total", return whether a contiguous sequence of "seq" sums up to "total". (Onsite interview questions are covered by NDA therefore can't post, but it can be said that the knowledge of data structures and handling edge cases are important for the coding interviews)

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