Lead architecture on AWS OpenSearch's cloud-scale search and analytics platform

Practice for a Senior SDE role (the JD's own body text names it 'Senior Software Development Engineer' despite the posting title) on the AWS OpenSearch Service team, working on search, analytics, and vector/AI workloads at cloud scale. Calibrated to the JD's real bar: 5+ years of professional software development plus 5+ years leading architecture/design and mentoring or tech-leading a team, working primarily in Java and Python and contributing upstream to OpenSearch.

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Likely format

Amazon's standard loop is publicly known: an online assessment/phone screen followed by an onsite/virtual loop of several rounds each pairing a coding or system-design problem with one of Amazon's Leadership Principles.

What this interview tests

Distributed search/indexing system design at scale
Java and Python proficiency
Architecture leadership and technical decision-making
Mentoring / tech lead experience
Query optimization, high availability, security in search systems
Contributing to a large open-source codebase (OpenSearch)

Common question themes

Design a scalable, highly-available search/indexing service

Describe a time you led an architecture decision that others had to follow

How would you optimize query performance in a search cluster under load

Tell me about mentoring an engineer through a hard technical problem

How do you contribute a change to a large open-source project like OpenSearch

Tradeoffs in designing for reliability vs. cost at cloud scale

How candidates describe it

Real Software Development Engineer interview stories — retold from candidates' public write-ups, with sources.

Amazon · SDE I (New Grad, MS CS)Offer

Amazon SDE 1 new grad loop: three online assessments, three interviews, offer in five days

A master's new grad went through Amazon's full three-part online assessment and three 45-minute virtual interviews. Every round opened with Leadership Principles questions before the coding began, and the offer landed within five business days.

Interviewed October 2019 · Seattle, WA, US

Amazon · SDE I (New Grad)Offer

Amazon SDE 1 new grad interview: one OA, four back-to-back onsite rounds, offer

A fresher found the posting through a LinkedIn connection, cleared the OA within a week of applying, and faced a six-hour virtual onsite: four one-hour rounds where every behavioral answer drew three to four follow-up questions.

Interviewed January 2021 · Seattle, WA, US

Amazon · SDE INo offer

Amazon SDE I Interview Experience: Global Selling Team, 2022

A LinkedIn referral bypassed Amazon's usual online assessment for this SDE I candidate, who then worked through a telephonic DSA screen and two technical rounds pairing coding problems with Amazon Leadership Principles questions before receiving no further response.

Interviewed March 2022 · Not specified

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