Google · Software Engineer (New Grad)
Google's new-grad loop is typically two phone/virtual screens followed by an onsite of four-plus interviews, and it leans harder on raw algorithmic depth than almost any other company. Problems trend toward medium-hard, and interviewers care as much about how you reason toward an optimal solution and analyze complexity as about the final code. "Googleyness & Leadership" is scored separately, and hiring is decided by a committee reviewing your written packet, not the interviewers in the room.
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What this interview tests
- Algorithmic depth (graphs, DP, tries, heaps, binary search)
- Big-O analysis and iterative optimization
- Structured problem decomposition and thinking out loud
- Clean, readable, correct code under time pressure
- Googleyness: collaboration and intellectual humility
- Taking hints and recovering without ego
Common question themes
Graph problems (connected components, topological sort)
Dynamic programming (grids, subsequences, partitions)
"Can you optimize this further?" follow-ups
Binary search on the answer / search-space problems
String and interval manipulation
"Tell me about a project you're proud of and how you collaborated"
Modeled on a public Google new-grad SWE posting