What is the interview process like at Amazon?

Amazon runs one standardised hiring machine across wildly different job families: an online assessment or recruiter screen, a phone screen, then a 'loop' of roughly four to six one-hour interviews with individual employees, one of whom is a Bar Raiser drawn from outside the hiring team and widely described as the hardest hour. What changes between families is only the technical half of each hour: coding plus low-level and high-level design for engineers, science breadth/depth plus a tech talk for scientists, AWS and Linux troubleshooting for cloud support, SQL for analysts, a timed Excel or written case for finance, and nothing technical at all for warehouse operations. The constant is the behavioural half, where each interviewer is assigned specific Leadership Principles and expects STAR-shaped stories with hard numbers. Candidates across every family report that this, not the technical work, is what decided their outcome.

What topics does Amazon test in interviews?

Commonly reported topics include Leadership principles, Algorithms, Coding, Whiteboard coding, Trees, Leadership Principles.

Amazon Interview Questions & Experience

Web Development Engineer

Not selected

Experienced. 7 rounds. Shared by Jay Huang on blog, 2014-01-10

1Technical phone screenPhone screenA shared-editor phone interview spanning front-end fundamentals and general algorithm work.Covered: JavaScript, web components, HTTP and servers, CSS, algorithms
2Onsite, algorithmsTechnicalA whiteboard algorithm question framed around Amazon's own marketplace.Covered: marketplace-flavoured algorithm problem
3Onsite, lunch with acting managerHiring managerAn informal conversation over lunch with the acting manager about his background.Covered: technical background, team context
4Onsite, algorithms and valuesTechnicalA second algorithm question focused on comparing approaches, paired with a values-based behavioural question.Covered: algorithm with trade-off analysis, behavioural question on Amazon's values
5Onsite, front-end buildTechnicalA hands-on front-end round where he had to reproduce a full page layout from a supplied screenshot.Covered: HTML, CSS, browser rendering behaviour, building a page from a screenshot
6Onsite, JavaScript depthTechnicalA deeper JavaScript round on implementation trade-offs and code organisation.Covered: comparing JavaScript implementations, DOM manipulation, modular code structure
7Recruiter wrap-upFinalA closing session with the lead recruiter covering compensation. Despite positive signals, no offer or rejection was ever sent.Covered: compensation discussion

Technical Account Manager (AWS)

Received an offer

Experienced. 6 rounds. Shared by Amir Malaeb on blog, 2025-02-27

1Online assessmentOnline assessmentAbout fifty minutes of mixed simulation and technical questions, with the result returned the next day.Covered: work simulation, technical multiple choice, work style survey
2Technical phone screenPhone screenAn hour covering roughly fifteen questions spread deliberately across the whole AWS surface rather than drilling one area.Covered: compute, storage and CDN, databases, networking, security, CI/CD, containers, analytics, cost optimisation
3Loop, technical breadthTechnicalThe first of a two-day loop, testing range.Covered: AWS services across domains
4Loop, technical depth plus behaviouralTechnicalA depth round with behavioural questions folded in.Covered: deep dive on selected services, Leadership Principles
5Hiring managerHiring managerAn entirely behavioural hour with the hiring manager.Covered: five behavioural questions
6Bar RaiserBar raiserThe closing round with an interviewer from outside the team.Covered: Leadership Principles

Applied Scientist II (Advertising Trust)

Not selected

Experienced. 6 rounds. Shared by Chaitanya Mundle on blog, 2025-02-09

1Phone screenPhone screenAn initial screen ahead of the multi-day loop.Covered: background, machine learning fundamentals
2Science breadthTechnicalOne of five hour-long loop rounds spread over three days, testing range across the science stack.Covered: broad machine learning and statistics knowledge
3Science depthTechnicalA depth round pushing hard on the specifics of his prior work.Covered: deep dive into his own research and modelling choices
4CodingTechnicalA standard coding hour inside a science loop.Covered: algorithmic coding
5Tech talk and system designPanelA presentation round combined with design discussion and behavioural questioning.Covered: presented research talk, applied science system design, behavioural questions
6Leadership PrinciplesBehavioralA dedicated behavioural round closing the loop.Covered: Leadership Principles

Software Development Engineer II (L5)

Not selected

Experienced. 6 rounds. Shared by LonelyLok on github, 2024-07-12

1Recruiter screenPhone screenAn inbound recruiter contact on LinkedIn led to a short background call, after which a coding challenge link arrived.Covered: background, experience, location preferences
2Online assessmentOnline assessmentA hosted coding challenge with two problems plus scenario questions about how to prioritise items in a hypothetical project.Covered: two medium-difficulty algorithm problems, work-prioritisation scenario questions
3Virtual onsite, interview 1TechnicalThe recruiter had briefed him that all four loop rounds would be roughly half behavioural and half technical, and the first followed exactly that shape.Covered: two Leadership Principle questions, medium algorithm problem
4Virtual onsite, interview 2System designSame split, with the technical half given over to a system design discussion.Covered: two Leadership Principle questions, high-level system design
5Virtual onsite, interview 3TechnicalA second coding round on the following day, again preceded by two behavioural questions.Covered: two Leadership Principle questions, medium algorithm problem
6Virtual onsite, interview 4Low-level designThe final hour paired two more Leadership Principle questions with a low-level design problem, a format he had not realised existed until the day before.Covered: two Leadership Principle questions, low-level / object-oriented design

Software Development Engineer II (L5)

Outcome not shared

Experienced. 6 rounds. Shared by kalekarnn on github, 2020-06-16

1Online assessmentOnline assessmentA timed coding component with two problems, a section asking him to describe his own solutions in prose, and the work-style and feedback surveys.Covered: optimal file merging, shortest path in a grid, written explanation of approach, work style survey
2Problem solving and codingTechnicalTwo or three problems where he had to argue the optimal approach first and then write the code out on paper.Covered: buy/sell profit maximisation, string scanning
3Data structures and algorithmsTechnicalA tree traversal problem and an implementation of a frequency-based cache eviction algorithm.Covered: binary tree top view, cache replacement policy implementation
4System designSystem designA single open-ended design of a related-items recommendation engine, covering both architecture and class structure.Covered: recommendation engine, high-level and low-level design
5ManagerialPanelA mixed round blending behavioural questions with detailed interrogation of his own systems, including being asked for exact numbers on performance work.Covered: Leadership Principles, architecture of his current projects, design justification, quantified performance improvements
6Hiring managerHiring managerA video conversation focused on self-critical retrospectives: failed designs, production breakage he was responsible for, and proposals of his that shipped.Covered: hardest problem solved, a design that failed, evaluating alternative systems for a use case, a production incident he caused

Software Development Engineer II (L5)

Not selected

Experienced. 5 rounds. Shared by u/nian2326076 on reddit, 2026-08-29

1Phone screenPhone screenA single algorithmic problem about counting contiguous subarrays summing to a target, solved with a running-sum-plus-hash-map approach. The candidate handled the follow-ups comfortably and rated this his strongest round.Covered: arrays, prefix sums, hash maps, follow-up variations
2Bar Raiser (low-level design + Leadership Principles)Bar raiserThe Bar Raiser came first rather than last and unexpectedly centred on low-level design: after about fifteen minutes on background and Leadership Principles, he was asked to model a multi-stage audio-buffer pipeline. He drifted into high-level architecture, was asked to code with roughly twelve minutes left, and could not finish.Covered: Leadership Principles, resume deep dive, object modelling, streaming/buffer pipeline design
3Low-level design (cache)Low-level designTen minutes of Leadership Principles, then a file-system cache design using an LRU policy backed by a linked list and a hash map. Discussion covered whether to move or recreate an accessed node and whether the cache should hold metadata or full file contents. He ran out of time before finishing every method.Covered: LRU eviction, doubly linked list, hash map, pointer handling, cache sizing trade-offs
4Hiring manager (high-level design + Leadership Principles)Hiring managerA high-level design of a third-party service pushing a feature announcement to users through a voice assistant. After being redirected away from entity modelling toward the end-to-end flow, he covered the happy path then failure handling for offline devices, and closed with a short discussion of how he uses generative AI in his workflow.Covered: service decomposition, notification delivery, offline devices, retries and fault tolerance, product trade-offs
5Coding (graph)TechnicalA short Leadership Principles and resume section followed by a dependency-ordering graph problem.Covered: Leadership Principles, course-dependency / topological ordering

Cloud Support Associate (AWS, Bangalore)

Received an offer

New grad. 5 rounds. Shared by Pranab Sharma on blog, 2020-07-04

1Online assessmentOnline assessmentA campus test with twenty aptitude questions, a core-CS section and thirty minutes of coding. Around six hundred people sat it. Fifty-four were interviewed the same day.Covered: aptitude multiple choice, core computer science multiple choice, two coding problems
2NetworkingTechnicalA dedicated networking round on protocol fundamentals.Covered: DHCP and the DORA exchange, DNS, the TCP handshake, SSL
3Operating systems and troubleshootingTechnicalA round focused on diagnosing system-level problems.Covered: OS internals, practical troubleshooting scenarios
4ManagerialHiring managerA managerial conversation following the technical rounds.Covered: role fit, scenario handling
5HR and Leadership PrinciplesBehavioralA closing behavioural round run explicitly against the principles.Covered: the Leadership Principles

Software Development Engineer (L6)

Not selected

Senior, US East Coast. 5 rounds. Shared by cloudartisans on hn, 2019-05-16

1Leadership principlesBehavioralBehavioral questions on the company's leadership principles, which went well.Covered: Leadership principles
2System designSystem designSystem design session that went well.
3Whiteboard codingTechnicalTwo hard computer science whiteboard problems that the candidate struggled with.Covered: Algorithms, Whiteboard coding
4Bar raiserBar raiserWeakest session of the day, likely decisive in the rejection.
5Lunch and org leader chatHiring managerNon-scored lunch plus an unexpected meeting with the senior leader of the group.

SDE-2

Received an offer

Experienced, Bengaluru, India, ~60 to 20 LPA CTC (base ~40-45 LPA, signing bonus ~20 lakhs, plus stock). 5 rounds. Shared by Scortier on youtube

1Online AssessmentOnline assessmentA roughly three-hour assessment with two medium-hard DSA problems (a binary-search question and a DP question) plus a software-engineering work-style section of MCQs and likely/not-likely ratings. Results came the same or next day.Covered: Data structures & algorithms, Dynamic programming, Leadership Principles
2Coding + BehavioralTechnicalA one-hour coding round starting with a binary-search problem where you give brute-force then optimal approach, write and dry-run the code (no run option) and state time/space complexity, followed by a second DP-medium problem, then one behavioral question answered with STAR.Covered: Data structures & algorithms, Dynamic programming, STAR stories, Leadership Principles
3Coding + BehavioralTechnicalSame coding pattern with a string-manipulation problem and a graph/BFS problem (extra time was allowed for the harder one), plus a behavioral question at the end.Covered: Arrays & strings, Graphs, Data structures & algorithms, Leadership Principles
4System DesignSystem designGiven a two-word prompt, you derive functional and non-functional requirements and design from a small scale up to a million users. The interviewer stays quiet, then stops you to deep-dive one section. Success hinges on articulating trade-offs convincingly.Covered: System design, Scalability, API design
5Bar RaiserBar raiserDescribed as the most decisive round. Can be DSA or system design (this one was a design-BookMyShow-style problem with a deep-dive into concurrent seat booking). A strong showing here can pull up weak signals from other rounds.Covered: System design, Leadership Principles, Behavioral

SDE-2

Received an offer

Experienced, Applied from India for a US role (Seattle). Joined via L1B visa. 5 rounds. Shared by Ashish Pratap Singh on youtube

1Online AssessmentOnline assessmentA two-hour test to complete within a week: two medium-difficulty coding problems (solved in about 45 minutes) plus multiple-choice questions on system design and behavioral aspects.Covered: Data structures & algorithms, System design, Behavioral
2Low-Level Design + CodingLow-level designDesign and code a real-world system following good coding principles, with the problem's complexity increasing gradually, plus leadership-principle behavioral questions.Covered: Low-level design, OOP, Leadership Principles
3System DesignSystem designDesign a real-world system end to end, defining APIs, database schemas and the high-level design, with leadership-principle questions woven in.Covered: System design, API design, DBMS, Leadership Principles
4CodingTechnicalA DSA coding round solving problems with data structures and algorithms, alongside leadership-principle behavioral questions.Covered: Data structures & algorithms, Leadership Principles
5CodingTechnicalA second DSA coding round in the same format, again with leadership-principle behavioral questions. All four interview rounds were scheduled on the same day.Covered: Data structures & algorithms, Leadership Principles

Software Development Engineer I (L4)

Received an offer

New grad. 4 rounds. Shared by u/Brave-Version-8757 on reddit, 2025-06-29

1Online assessmentOnline assessmentTwo coding problems of moderate and high difficulty, followed by Amazon's work-simulation and work-style components. He solved one fully and one partially and still advanced.Covered: two algorithmic problems, work simulation, work style assessment
2Coding interviewTechnicalSeventy minutes covering one medium and one hard problem, with feedback afterwards that his problem solving was fine but his explanation of past work was weak.Covered: greedy / jump-game style problems, binary tree covering
3Coding plus Leadership PrinciplesTechnicalNinety minutes split between two algorithm problems and four behavioural questions. The interviewer gave no live feedback beyond confirming his communication was fine.Covered: stacks / greedy digit removal, shortest path with cost and time constraints, Leadership Principles: pride in work, diving deep, independent delivery, communicating slippage
4Bar RaiserBar raiserA short thirty-five-minute round with a long-tenured engineering manager, spent almost entirely on one deep question about a complex problem he had researched and prototyped. He felt he had failed it. He got the offer two days later.Covered: Dive Deep, Earn Trust, Customer Obsession, a complex research-driven problem from his own work

Solutions Architect (AWS)

Received an offer

Experienced. 4 rounds. Shared by Prasad Rao on blog, 2024-10-10

1Technical phone screenPhone screenA short technical screen of roughly thirty-five minutes.Covered: AWS services, architecture fundamentals
2Behavioural screenBehavioralA brief behavioural block of about fifteen minutes appended to the screen, followed by time for the candidate's own questions.Covered: STAR stories, Leadership Principles
3Take-home assignmentTake-homeAn untimed exercise debugging a broken infrastructure template and writing up architectural recommendations.Covered: infrastructure-as-code troubleshooting, written architecture recommendations
4LoopPanelFive interviews, predominantly behavioural rather than technical.Covered: Leadership Principles, architecture discussion

Technical Account Manager (AWS)

Received an offer

Experienced. 4 rounds. Shared by Roger Nem on blog, 2024-07-30

1HR screenPhone screenA recruiter screen in early March, roughly seven weeks after he applied in mid-January.Covered: background, role fit, logistics
2Hiring managerHiring managerA one-hour conversation with the hiring manager in late March.Covered: experience, Leadership Principles
3Recruiter prep callPhone screenA dedicated preparation call from the recruiter ahead of the virtual loop.Covered: loop format, Leadership Principles briefing
4Virtual loopPanelSix or seven one-hour sessions on Amazon Chime in a single day, including a Bar Raiser, with each interviewer carrying their own assigned set of Leadership Principles. The offer came a week later.Covered: AWS technical breadth, Leadership Principles (two or three assigned per interviewer), customer scenarios

Application Security Engineer

Not selected

unknown. 4 rounds. Shared by Sohcahtoa82 on hn, 2023-06-26

1Recruiter callPhone screenInitial recruiter conversation.
2Phone screenPhone screenTechnical phone screen.
3Loop: behavioralBehavioralThree hour-long sessions of leadership-principle questions with much overlap.Covered: Leadership principles
4Loop: codingTechnicalOne coding exercise. No AppSec-specific technical questions.

Role not stated

Not selected

unknown, Europe. 4 rounds. Shared by dissolved_boy on hn, 2018-11-04

1Technical screenPhone screenAn initial technical screening.
2Recruiter callPhone screenA video call with a recruiter, who shared prep resources.Covered: Leadership principles
3Hiring eventTechnicalAt a hotel hiring event, three interviewers came to the candidate's room for algorithm sessions.Covered: Algorithms, Data structures
4System designSystem designOne system design interview at the same event.

SDE-1

Received an offer

New grad, India (Amazon Music team). 4 rounds. Shared by Abhishek Khanna on youtube

1Online AssessmentOnline assessmentTwo medium-to-hard DSA problems plus a work-style assessment that puts you in simulated on-the-job scenarios to gauge fit against the leadership principles. Fully solving one problem (with the other partially passing test cases) can still earn an interview call.Covered: Data structures & algorithms, Leadership Principles
2Technical + BehavioralTechnicalTwo LeetCode-medium DSA questions (a 2D-matrix problem and a line-sweep problem) followed by leadership-principle behavioral questions, with about 45 minutes for coding and 10-15 for behavioral. Clear communication of the approach mattered as much as finishing the code.Covered: Arrays & strings, Data structures & algorithms, Leadership Principles
3Technical + BehavioralTechnicalSame format: two medium DSA problems (a strings problem and a monotonic-stack problem) plus leadership-principle questions. This round was effectively repeated, the second time by a senior engineer using priority queues and a Splitwise-style problem, where explaining the reasoning carried the round despite not finishing the code.Covered: Arrays & strings, Data structures & algorithms, Leadership Principles
4Bar RaiserBar raiserConducted by a principal engineer, entirely experience-based with no coding. A single question with roughly 40 minutes of deep-diving into internship work, design choices in projects, and how decisions were made in different scenarios.Covered: Behavioral, Leadership Principles, Past projects, STAR stories

SDE

Received an offer

Experienced, India (off-campus, prior role at Infosys). 4 rounds. Shared by PramoVerse on youtube

1Online AssessmentOnline assessmentTwo DSA problems, one easy and one medium-to-hard, plus leadership-principle questions, all within a fixed time window. A long silence with no confirmation or rejection followed.Covered: Data structures & algorithms, Leadership Principles
2Technical + BehavioralTechnicalTwo DSA problems drawn from dynamic programming, graphs and heaps, solved within the allotted time, with the full thought process and edge cases explained aloud. Scenario-based leadership-principle questions were mixed in.Covered: Dynamic programming, Graphs, Data structures & algorithms, Leadership Principles
3Technical + BehavioralTechnicalA second coding round in the same pattern as round two: two DSA problems solved in time with edge cases explained, alongside situational leadership-principle questions.Covered: Data structures & algorithms, Leadership Principles
4Bar RaiserBar raiserNo coding. Entirely leadership-principle focused, probing how you handle situations, manage a team, take ownership and lead. The offer came from HR two days later.Covered: Behavioral, Leadership Principles, STAR stories

SDE-1

Not selected

New grad, ~46 LPA (offered range). 3 rounds. Shared by @coolcoder56 on X, 2026-06-28

1Online AssessmentOnline assessmentAn online assessment combining coding problems with Amazon's work-style / work-simulation section.Covered: Data structures & algorithms, Work simulation
2Hiring ManagerHiring managerA hiring-manager round centered on the Leadership Principles, expecting structured STAR-format stories from past work.Covered: Leadership Principles, Behavioral (STAR)
3Bar RaiserBar raiserThe Bar Raiser round, mixing further Leadership-Principles probing with a technical problem. This candidate's loop ended in a rejection at the final stage.Covered: Leadership Principles, Data structures & algorithms

Software Development Engineer (campus hiring)

Not selected

New grad. 3 rounds. Shared by u/RangerEvery1931 on reddit, 2026-06-24

1Online assessment, coding halfOnline assessmentA one-hour coding half on a hosted platform with two problems, which he describes as easy enough that most of his cohort cleared it.Covered: sliding window / two pointers with a distinct-element constraint, longest bitonic subsequence
2Online assessment, culture-fit halfOnline assessmentA one-hour behavioural assessment in three parts. A senior already at Amazon told him this was the round that actually filtered people, because the coding half was easy. The instrument deliberately repeats similar items to test whether your answers stay consistent.Covered: agree/disagree statement batteries, choosing the best reply to workplace emails, forced-choice personality items, answer consistency
3Technical interviewTechnicalA single round on Amazon Chime with two panellists and two standard problems, worked from brute force through binary-search optimisation. He performed well but was cut because the actual headcount landed at eight rather than the roughly twenty candidates the cohort had been told to expect.Covered: search in a sorted 2D matrix, symmetric binary tree

Cloud Support Associate Intern (Nairobi)

Outcome not shared

Internship. 3 rounds. Shared by Felista Njeri on blog, 2026-03-06

1Networking plus behaviouralTechnicalThe first of three back-to-back forty-five-minute interviews separated by short breaks.Covered: networking fundamentals, Leadership Principles
2Operating systems, databases and LinuxTechnicalA hands-on fundamentals round covering boot order, basic SQL and everyday Linux tooling.Covered: OS boot sequence, SQL, common Linux commands, troubleshooting
3Managerial and Leadership PrinciplesBehavioralA managerial round run across the full set of principles.Covered: all sixteen Leadership Principles

Role not stated

Outcome not shared

unknown. 3 rounds. Shared by thinkharderdev on hn, 2025-10-21

1Recruiter prep callPhone screenRecruiter supplied a study list and suggested several hours of preparation.Covered: CS fundamentals study list
2Phone screenPhone screenA fairly ordinary coding question plus general discussion. Passed.Covered: Coding, General experience
3Second prep callPhone screenAnother long preparation call before the all-day loop, after which the candidate withdrew.

Senior Program Manager (L6)

Not selected

Experienced. 3 rounds. Shared by Namrata Neogi on linkedin, 2023-02-01

1Telephonic screenPhone screenAn hour-long screen roughly twenty days after the recruiter's first contact, consisting entirely of situational behavioural questions.Covered: three situational Leadership Principle questions
2Writing assessmentTake-homeA written exercise where she picked one of two prompts and returned a STAR-structured response within about forty-eight hours, submitted two days before the onsite.Covered: written STAR narrative, choice of two prompts
3Onsite loopPanelFive one-hour rounds spread over two days, all behavioural, including a Bar Raiser and some rounds with shadowing observers. She was told she was better suited to L5 and placed in a six-month talent pool rather than rejected outright.Covered: Leadership Principles, quantified outcomes, rejected alternatives

Software Engineer

Outcome not shared

unknown. 3 rounds. Shared by treyfitty on hn, 2022-04-09

1Final loopBehavioralSix interviewers, most of whom came across as aggressive or scripted.Covered: Leadership principles
2Bar raiserBar raiserFollow-up questions repeated material already answered.
3Design interviewSystem designDesign discussion where the interviewer insisted on a message-queue approach over WebSockets.Covered: Real-time collaborative editing, WebSockets vs Kafka

AWS

Not selected

unknown. 3 rounds. Shared by smarmgoblin on hn, 2022-03-10

1Coding interviewsTechnicalProgramming rounds that went very well.
2System designSystem designA system design round that went very well.
3Leadership principlesBehavioralThe interviewer doubted an example involving a period without a manager. Time ran out for a coding question.Covered: Leadership principles

Role not stated

Not selected

Senior. 3 rounds. Shared by downvote_magnet on hn, 2021-11-27

1Coding interviewsTechnicalProgramming questions that felt more practical than typical puzzle problems.
2Leadership principle questionsBehavioralExpected to give prepared career stories demonstrating each leadership principle.Covered: Leadership principles
3Hiring managerHiring managerThe hiring manager was the last interview and came across as hostile.

Area Manager Intern (fulfillment centre operations, Seattle)

Received an offer

Internship. 3 rounds. Shared by Kaitlyn Susa (University of Arizona Eller College career blog) on blog, 2021-09-29

1Sourcing and applicationPhone screenA recruiter approached her on LinkedIn after reviewing her experience and expected graduation date. She then applied through the site.Covered: background, graduation timing
2Two online assessmentsOnline assessmentTwo rounds of online assessment testing interpersonal skills and situational judgement, with no technical component.Covered: soft skills, situational awareness and analysis
3Video panelPanelA video interview on Amazon Chime with two separate current employees, entirely behavioural. The hiring decision came back within three days.Covered: STAR stories, past experience

Role not stated

Outcome not shared

unknown. 3 rounds. Shared by Zimahl on hn, 2019-08-05

1Database team interviewTechnicalFirst attempt, with a team mismatched to a UI-focused background.
2Search team interviewTechnicalSecond attempt that went well.
3Coding assignmentTake-homeA follow-up assignment with no clear way to submit it.

Senior Technical Account Manager (AWS, Barcelona)

Received an offer

Experienced. 3 rounds. Shared by Özgür Özdemircili on blog, 2019-05-07

1Technical phone screenPhone screenAn hour with a senior TAM covering core cloud and networking knowledge.Covered: AWS fundamentals, TCP/IP, OSI model
2Behavioural phone screenHiring managerAn hour with his prospective manager, entirely behavioural.Covered: Leadership Principles, past experience
3Onsite loopPanelFive or six hours onsite with five interviewers: the hiring manager, two other TAMs, someone from an adjacent product team and a skip-level.Covered: AWS depth, customer handling, Leadership Principles

Amazon Pathways (warehouse operations leadership programme)

Received an offer

New grad. 3 rounds. Shared by Dhanishth Khosla (Michigan Ross student-voices blog) on blog, 2018-02-20

1ApplicationOnline assessmentA standard application and resume submission.Covered: resume screen
2Business simulationOnline assessmentA simulation scoring the quality of his decisions, which he understood to be continuously assessing whether he behaved like an Amazon leader.Covered: decision quality, consistency with Leadership Principles
3Interview seriesBehavioralA sequence of behavioural interviews. He was run against two different roles in parallel. One went noticeably better and it was the Pathways one he actually wanted.Covered: Leadership Principles, past experience

Role not stated

Not selected

unknown. 3 rounds. Shared by utnick on hn, 2017-02-21

1Recruiter callPhone screenInitial call after recruiter outreach.
2Coding testOnline assessmentTake-home coding test, reported as passed.
3OnsiteTechnicalAll-day interviews about four weeks later. Told it was close and to retry in six months.

AWS

Not selected

Senior. 3 rounds. Shared by skynetv2 on hn, 2015-08-15

1HR briefingPhone screenBenefits and pay were reviewed before interviews.Covered: Compensation, Benefits
2LunchHiring managerLunch with the hiring manager.
3Bar raiserBar raiserRapid-fire behavioral questions, such as unplanned work done for a customer. The loop ended early afterward.Covered: Customer obsession, Behavioral

Role not stated

Outcome not shared

unknown. 3 rounds. Shared by potatolicious on hn, 2015-06-28

1Phone screenPhone screenScreens run by team engineers. Most referred candidates failed.
2Onsite loopFinalFull day of six to eight back-to-back interviews including lunch.
3Bar raiserBar raiserA designated senior interviewer from outside the team could veto an otherwise positive panel.

Role not stated

Not selected

unknown. 3 rounds. Shared by hiddenl on hn, 2011-10-12

1Technical callPhone screenAn hour-long technical phone conversation.
2OnsitePanelA full day of back-to-back sessions with two or more interviewers each, lunch included.
3Bar raiserBar raiserOne interviewer identified himself as the bar raiser during the onsite.

Non-technical operations / customer support (voice/non-voice process)

Received an offer

Experienced, Hyderabad, India (walk-in), ~4 LPA plus cab, food and other employee benefits. 3 rounds. Shared by A Canopy Life on youtube

1Group DiscussionGroup exerciseA basic group discussion as the first filter at the walk-in drive, where hundreds of candidates attend and only a fraction advance.Covered: Behavioral, Customer scenarios
2AssessmentAssessment centreA scored assessment round. You must clear a required threshold to proceed, described as the important gating step.Covered: Aptitude, Customer scenarios
3ManagerialHiring managerA relatively simple managerial conversation focused on communication skills, how you approach situations and whether you can handle the fast-paced role.Covered: Behavioral, Customer scenarios

Communications / marketing (Nashville)

Received an offer

Experienced, a "$25,000 pay cut", offset by anticipated four-year stock. She notes "Amazon does not really negotiate". 2 rounds. Shared by Mallory Waxman on blog, 2026-08-21

1Attempt 1 (2021): Onsite loopPanelAn eight-hour loop across two days with eight interviewers including a Bar Raiser. She was rejected with the feedback that she needed more technology-sector experience.Covered: Leadership Principles, communications experience
2Attempt 2 (2023): LoopPanelA second application two years later that converted into an accepted offer, with a start date in October 2023.Covered: Leadership Principles, prepared STAR stories

Systems Engineer (L5)

Not selected

Experienced, Germany. 2 rounds. Shared by ikut3hva on hn, 2025-08-02

1First interviewPhone screenInitial interview round.
2Interview loopBehavioralLoop focused on stories from past work. Led to a verbal offer that was later withdrawn over a new EU-citizenship requirement.Covered: Experience stories

AWS

Received an offer

unknown. 2 rounds. Shared by nonameiguess on hn, 2024-05-15

1Interview loopPanelSessions with interviewers from unrelated disciplines, some non-technical.
2Developer chatBehavioralAn optional conversation with a developer who had no hiring input.

Product Manager (MBA recruiting, Marketplace)

Received an offer

New grad. 2 rounds. Shared by Engineer Seeking FIRE on blog, 2023-10-26

1Rounds 1-2: Two phone screensPhone screenTwo screening calls during MBA recruiting. He rates one of them as mediocre and the other strong, and still advanced.Covered: background, product thinking, Leadership Principles
2Rounds 3-6: Onsite in SeattlePanelFour in-person product interviews, almost all anchored on real Amazon products rather than abstract prompts, with the Bar Raiser the hardest of the set. He chose Marketplace over AWS and Kindle after the offer.Covered: product design, product strategy, Amazon's own products, Leadership Principles

Role not stated

Outcome not shared

Manager. 2 rounds. Shared by fatnoah on hn, 2023-05-09

1Recruiter screenPhone screenInitial recruiter conversation.
2Hiring manager screenHiring managerFirst manager screen before the role disappeared in a reorg and recruiters cycled out.

Role not stated

Not selected

unknown. 2 rounds. Shared by haskellandchill on hn, 2023-04-13

1Algorithm interviewsTechnicalOn one attempt the candidate breezed through the algorithm questions.Covered: Algorithms
2Leadership assessmentBehavioralWas marked down on technical leadership. An earlier attempt had the reverse result.Covered: Technical leadership

Role not stated

Outcome not shared

unknown. 2 rounds. Shared by gitfan86 on hn, 2023-02-22

1Online assessmentOnline assessmentScenario questions such as choosing which delivery driver to let go.Covered: Situational judgment
2One-on-one interviewsBehavioralInterviewers cited the share price as what they liked most about the company.

Software Development Engineer

Not selected

Senior. 2 rounds. Shared by godtoldmetodoit on hn, 2022-12-06

1Interview roundsBehavioralSeveral rounds requiring stories mapped to the leadership principles, with days taken off work to attend.Covered: Leadership principles, Career stories
2Final roundFinalAfter the final round there was no follow-up until the candidate asked and learned someone else was chosen.

Security Engineer

Not selected

unknown. 2 rounds. Shared by Sohcahtoa82 on hn, 2022-09-09

1Phone screenPhone screenInitial AWS screen.
2Interview loopFinalFive-hour loop ending in rejection.

Role not stated

Not selected

unknown, Seattle, WA. 2 rounds. Shared by jugg1es on hn, 2022-04-02

1OnsiteFinalFlown in for interviews that seemed positive, followed by weeks of silence and a rejection without feedback.
2Later phone screenPhone screenOn a later attempt the candidate failed the initial screen.

Role not stated

Outcome not shared

unknown. 2 rounds. Shared by throwntoday on hn, 2021-11-17

1Interview 1TechnicalThe interviewer arrived late and unprepared.
2Coding interviewTechnicalThe interviewer repeatedly interrupted for explanations of basic code while the candidate narrated.

Software Engineer (Aurora DB team)

Not selected

unknown, India. 2 rounds. Shared by throwawayam on hn, 2021-10-12

1Weekend hiring eventTechnicalMass in-office interview day with several rounds starting hours late. Final round was a whiteboard data-structure problem.Covered: Data structures, Whiteboard coding
2Follow-up loopBehavioralAbout five more rounds over a month with heavy emphasis on the company's leadership principles.Covered: Leadership principles

Role not stated

Received an offer

Senior. 2 rounds. Shared by buro9 on hn, 2021-08-02

1Interview seriesTechnicalFourteen interviews over more than three months.
2Technical testOnline assessmentAn additional five-hour technical assessment.

Role not stated

Not selected

unknown, Brazil. 2 rounds. Shared by speeder on hn, 2021-07-01

1Phone interviewPhone screenScheduled interviewer did not show. A substitute with no context held an awkward hour-long call.
2Onsite at Brazilian HQBehavioralSeveral late-arriving interviewers each asked the same question about resolving conflict in a large team.Covered: Leadership principles, Conflict resolution

Machine Learning Engineer

Outcome not shared

Senior. 2 rounds. Shared by marcinzm on hn, 2020-11-28

1Automated coding exerciseOnline assessmentEasy online coding test, sent for the wrong role.
2Phone screenPhone screenForty minutes of academic textbook-style questions with no advance warning.Covered: Textbook ML theory

Software Development Engineer Intern

Received an offer

Internship. 2 rounds. Shared by noob-coder on github, 2020-09-13

1Campus online assessmentOnline assessmentA four-section campus test covering debugging, two coding problems, an aptitude section and a personality/leadership questionnaire. Forty-one students from his cohort advanced.Covered: code debugging, linked lists, backtracking / memoisation, aptitude and logical reasoning, psychometric assessment
2Technical interviewTechnicalA virtual interview that opened with roughly ten minutes on his own project, then two problems where he was pushed from brute force to optimal, asked to derive complexity formally, and asked to dry-run his own code on a test case he invented.Covered: own project deep dive, binary search trees, tree subtree-sum property, sliding window with a flip budget, time and space complexity

Consultant (AWS Professional Services)

Received an offer

Experienced. 2 rounds. Shared by scarface74 on hn, 2020-07-27

1Technical interviewTechnicalHigh-level check on core AWS knowledge.Covered: AWS
2Leadership principles interviewsBehavioralFully remote behavioral questions about past situations tied to the company's leadership principles.Covered: Leadership principles

Role not stated

Outcome not shared

unknown. 2 rounds. Shared by glenngillen on hn, 2020-07-16

1Loop interviewsBehavioralEach interviewer is assigned one or two leadership principles and probes past examples for the full hour.Covered: Leadership principles
2DebriefFinalInterviewers argue for or against hiring using written evidence. The bar is pass/fail rather than ranking.

Software Development Engineer

Outcome not shared

unknown. 2 rounds. Shared by BeetleB on hn, 2020-07-16

1Online assessmentOnline assessmentOnline screen passed on several occasions.
2Phone screenPhone screenPassed, but the onsite was never scheduled as recruiters stopped responding.

Consultant (AWS Professional Services)

Outcome not shared

Experienced. 2 rounds. Shared by scarface74 on hn, 2020-06-14

1Technical screenTechnicalSingle technical interview at roughly associate-level AWS architecture certification depth.Covered: AWS
2Virtual loopBehavioralStructured virtual interviews focused on soft-skill questions and describing past projects.Covered: Soft skills, Past projects

Role not stated

Not selected

Senior, Seattle, WA. 2 rounds. Shared by amir734jj on hn, 2020-04-30

1Online screenOnline assessmentTwo algorithm problems in about two hours. Both solved with passing tests.Covered: Algorithms, Unit tests
2Virtual loopTechnicalFour hours of online algorithm problems, all solved. Rejected citing technical skills.Covered: Algorithms, Time complexity

Vendor Manager / key account management intern (Madrid)

Received an offer

Internship. 2 rounds. Shared by Roxanne Leslie Laurido (IESE MBA blog) on blog, 2019-08-28

1First interviewBehavioralOne hour split between two interviewers at thirty minutes each, entirely behavioural.Covered: Leadership Principles, data analysis, handling a difficult colleague
2Final interviewFinalThe same format again, two interviewers at thirty minutes each. Across both rounds she was asked roughly eight to twelve behavioural questions and no technical or case questions at all.Covered: Leadership Principles, a mistake she made, disagreeing with management

Role not stated

Received an offer

unknown. 2 rounds. Shared by tempjobthrow on hn, 2019-06-20

1Loop interviewsBehavioralHour-long sessions each probing fit with the leadership principles, requiring repeated stories.Covered: Leadership principles
2Bar raiserBar raiserA last-minute substitute by phone who interrupted often with scattered questions.

Software Engineer (special projects)

Received an offer

unknown. 2 rounds. Shared by bastawhiz on hn, 2018-11-04

1Written narrativeTake-homeRequired to submit an exactly four-page essay before being invited onsite.Covered: Writing
2Onsite loopTechnicalExhausting day of coding on a provided laptop in a bare editor that could not run code. Project details were withheld.Covered: Coding

Software Engineer

Outcome not shared

unknown, Seattle, WA. 2 rounds. Shared by ljw1001 on hn, 2018-04-24

1Final round whiteboardTechnicalAfter an early cross-country flight, wrote a correct merge sort on a whiteboard many hours into the day.Covered: Merge sort, Whiteboard coding
2Binary arithmetic codingTechnicalAsked to implement basic arithmetic on binary numbers. The candidate bowed out.Covered: Binary number arithmetic

Role not stated

Outcome not shared

unknown. 2 rounds. Shared by rdtsc on hn, 2017-07-01

1Phone screenPhone screenInterviewer initially forgot to call.
2OnsiteTechnicalDisorganized AWS onsite with a missing manager, leadership-principle questions and whiteboard puzzles.Covered: Leadership principles, Whiteboard puzzles

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