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      Software Engineer Interview

      4 Jan 2019
      Anonymous interview candidate
      Oslo
      No offer
      Positive experience
      Difficult interview

      Application

      I applied online. The process took 4 weeks. I interviewed at Microsoft (Oslo) in Nov 2018

      Interview

      There was a technical Skype interview followed by a series of interviews on-site. These interviews were for an entry-level university full-time position for the Oslo office in Norway. The phone interview was straight-forward, with a palindrome programming question, followed by some questions of general computer science topics (complexity, memory, etc.) in addition to some specific questions regarding my area of expertise. Within a couple of days, I received an email with the details on how to book a flight to their office for an on-site interview. The on-site interview was a little bit more thorough; each candidate underwent 3-4 interviews in a row, rotating interviewers every 45 minutes with a 5-minute break in between. Each interviewer started by asking some general, open-ended questions - not necessarily relating to programming. They told me that the interview process had recently been changed across Microsoft and that these open-ended questions were asked to gauge how the candidates think. The first two interviewers then asked some programming related questions (write a linked list in C, how does memory and resource management differ from C and garbage collected languages,) along with some discussion. Note that we were asked to program on a white board. The third interview asked a different and unexpected question about building a library (not the programming variant) that can support millions of users; what factors should you consider when building such a library (e.g. how to organize the books, how tall should the shelfs be, etc)? Note also that each interview ended by asking if I had any questions, so it would be wise not to ask every question to the first interviewer.

      Interview questions [4]

      Question 1

      Write a program that checks if a string is a palindrome. What's its complexity?
      1 Answer

      Question 2

      Write a simple singly-linked list in C
      Answer question

      Question 3

      How does memory and resource management differ from C++ to a garbage collected language such as Python?
      Answer question

      Question 4

      How would you build/design a library (not the programming type) that can handle a million users, containing every book from 1970 and which will also support books 30 years in the future from now?
      Answer question
      2

      Other Software Engineer interview reviews for Microsoft

      Software Engineer Interview

      7 Jul 2026
      Anonymous interview candidate
      No offer
      Positive experience
      Average interview

      Application

      I interviewed at Microsoft

      Interview

      Was a typical first round recruiter screen - pretty straightforward but didn't end up getting moved vforwards. Prompt, Professional and overall a good experience. They asked me about my background, explained the role and it was with the recruitment team.

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      Describe your background going into detial in each role
      Answer question

      Software Engineer Interview

      3 Jul 2026
      Anonymous interview candidate
      No offer
      Negative experience
      Average interview

      Application

      I interviewed at Microsoft

      Interview

      Expect a lengthy hiring process that can take at least two months from start to finish. In my experience, there was approximately one month of interviews followed by another month waiting for the final decision. Be prepared for a slow timeline, especially after completing all interview stages.

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      Tell me about a time where have above and beyond for a customer
      Answer question

      Software Engineer I Interview

      20 Jun 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
      2