I applied through a recruiter. I interviewed at Instacart (South San Francisco, CA) in May 2021
Interview
Phone screen coder pad interview.
4 stage question
Had a complete optimal solution with all stages answered and all test cases passing. Verbally communicated my strategy and my thought process throughout. The interviewer agreed that everything worked correctly and it was optimal.
Two days later generic rejection email from the recruiter with no feedback. I asked for feedback and was ghosted.
I would not interview with them again. How a company treats candidates is a reflection of culture and I don't want to be a part of Instacart.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
4 stages.
1 Create a class that stores a value and gets a value.
2 allow that class to store values with a timestamp
3 be able to retrieve the value at a timestamp when given a key with a timestamp.
4 If the timestamp doesn't exist return the closest value to that timestamp along with the closest timestamp
I'm sure it's easier to grade applicants with AI, but it'd be nice to have humans involved in the interview process, too. You'll face a couple of AI powered coding challenges. The bigger problems are the ethical implications here after looking into how the company works, with variable pricing based on data on how badly they can screw the consumer with upcharges and how to keep money in their pockets rather than the shoppers & drivers
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
If you could replace your family with AI, would you do it?
I applied online. I interviewed at Instacart (San Francisco, CA) in Feb 2026
Interview
First there is a codesignal test. This is for 90 minutes and felt frantic. Way too many features/code paths to implement.
Then there is the karat llm interview which is 50 minutes.
Then a full day of regular interview loop.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
For CodeSignal it was implementing a cache key store with timestamps. Started with basic setting and getting, then evolved into more advanced code. 4 different parts. Writing a lot of code for this.
For the LLM interview you work with a company called Karat. You are giving an VS code like workspace and an ai to help. You have 50 minutes. They then dump a large project in your space. For me it was a bus route simulator.
I was then asked to implement a feature : Have the system prioritize Priority Pass people. I used the LLM to track down the code and implement it, but it was difficult to test in code that is unknown to me. The next feature was implementing wheelchairs for the bus which requires special capacity checks.
I applied online. The process took 4 weeks. I interviewed at Instacart (Toronto, ON) in Feb 2025
Interview
1. Online OA with codesignal to start with. Very standard and not hard
2. Got the 4 interview rounds and you can always divide into 2 parts of 2 interviews each. It was be 2 codesignals with medium difficulty and I managed to do both. One system design which was average for me and interviewer was okay as well. Behavioural round was standard. No wonder why I didn't manage to get the offer.
3
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