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      Software Engineer Interview

      Dec 22, 2010
      Anonymous employee
      Redmond, WA
      Accepted offer
      Positive experience
      Difficult interview

      Application

      I applied through college or university. The process took 2 weeks. I interviewed at Microsoft (Redmond, WA) in Jan 2008

      Interview

      I interviewed as a senior in college. The interviewing process consisted of two phases for me: (1) a single on-campus interview when Microsoft visited my college campus, and (2) a day-long on-site interview at Microsoft's campus in Redmond. The on-campus interview was with an engineer and consisted of some simple technical questions. We also talked a bit about some programming projects I had worked on at school. I believe they were looking for basic technical chops and enthusiasm for engineering. The on-site interview consisted of one interview with an HR person and 4 interviews with engineers (two from one product/team, and two from a completely different product/team). The interview with the HR person was non-technical and focused on why I was interested in becoming an engineer. The interviews with engineers were all technical in nature. They mostly consisted of programming and algorithms questions of moderate difficulty --- the usual affair. I also had lunch at some point with one of the engineers I ended up interviewing with. One of the technical interviews was fairly nonstandard. I was asked to come up with a design (hardware/software) for a robotic telescope. The question was very open-ended, though the interviewer of course gave some guidance. I believe the purpose of the question was to gauge the ability of the candidate to design a (real-world) system.

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      Describe how to design a robotic telescope. Talk about hardware (robotics/sensors); talk about software (linear algebra/control).
      Answer question

      Other Software Engineer Interview Reviews for Microsoft

      Software Engineer I Interview

      Jun 20, 2026
      Anonymous Interview Candidate
      Melbourne
      No offer
      Positive experience
      Average interview

      Application

      I applied online. I interviewed at Microsoft (Melbourne)

      Interview

      After submitting an online application, I received a HackerRank assessment after passing the resume screening stage, then I was rejected after completing the assessment and did not proceed to further interview rounds.

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      The assessment consisted of two LeetCode-medium-level coding questions to be completed within 75 minutes.
      Answer question
      1

      Software Developer Interview

      Jun 24, 2026
      Anonymous Interview Candidate
      San Francisco, CA
      No offer
      Neutral experience
      Difficult interview

      Application

      I interviewed at Microsoft (San Francisco, CA)

      Interview

      45 mins technical interview with a member of their San fran team. Very relaxed and informal but questions were focused and lots of follow ups. Easy to schedule as was over video conferencing platform

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      Questions surrounding Markov chains etc
      Answer question

      Software Engineer Interview

      Jun 15, 2026
      Anonymous Interview Candidate
      Seattle, WA
      Declined offer
      Positive experience
      Average interview

      Application

      I interviewed at Microsoft (Seattle, WA)

      Interview

      Straightforward technical loop overall, with strong interviewers at every stage. I genuinely enjoyed the in-depth conversations around technical challenges and algorithmic problem-solving — the entire process felt well-structured and genuinely engaging.

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      LRU Cache System Design LLD
      Answer question