Microsoft interview experience Real time questions & tips from candidates to crack your interview

SDE - Intern

Microsoft

2 rounds | 4 Coding problems

Shelly Gupta

Fresher | Apr 2023

Selected

Interview preparation journey

Journey

I was admitted to IIT Roorkee for B.Tech in Computer Science. Firstly I planned that I will start learning DSA in the first year, but I could not (I wasted my first year in fun, but it is also essential I guess). So, I started DSA from the fourth semester and along with DSA, I also learned development because that is what I wanted to be. By the end of the Third year, I was confident in both DSA and development but even then, I keep on revising the concepts.

Application story

It was the last of March, many companies were coming to the campus to hire candidates. I got a message in my telegram group about the company visiting our campus for the hiring of an SDE-Intern. I took part in the hiring drive of Microsoft. The interview process started at the start of April.

Why selected/rejected for the role?

I was able to explain and write optimized code for each question asked by the interviewer. I was upto point and interviewer was quite impressed from me.

Preparation

Duration: 2 months

Topics: Puzzles, OOPS, Data Structures Algorithms, DBMS, Logical Reasoning, Aptitude Questions

Tip

Tip 1 : For Microsoft, puzzles are must, so you should prepare it thoroughly.
Tip 2 : Practice Company specific DS Algo questions from LeetCode,GFG etc.
Tip 3 : Have deep knowledge about your projects.

Application process

Where: Campus

Eligibility: 6.5

Resume tip

Tip 1 : Mention projects which you can explain and defend clearly.
Tip 2 : Resume should always be crisp and clear and should be of 1 page.
Tip 3 : If you do competitive programming , you can put links of your various online platforms profiles like Codechef, Codeforces etc.
Tip 4 : There should not be any false achievements or false experience mentioned in the resume.

Interview rounds

Round

Medium

Online Coding Interview

Duration120 mins

Interview date5 Apr 2023

Coding problem2

This was the first round and it consisted of 40 MCQs from aptitude , logical reasoning etc. and 2 programming questions.
The test was on AMCAT platform.
The test was of 2 hours , web-proctored and switching between tabs was not allowed.

1. Trapping Rain Water

Moderate

15m average time

80% success

0/80

Asked in companies

You have been given a long type array/list 'arr’ of size 'n’.

It represents an elevation map wherein 'arr[i]’ denotes the elevation ...

Problem approach

1. Create two array left and right of size n. create a variable max_ = INT_MIN.
2. Run one loop from start to end. In each iteration update max_ as max_ = max(max_, arr[i]) and also assign left[i] = max_
3. Update max_ = INT_MIN.
4. Run another loop from end to start. In each iteration update max_ as max_ = max(max_, arr[i]) and also assign right[i] = max_
5.Traverse the array from ...

Try solving now

2. Count ways to reach the nth stairs

Moderate

30m average time

80% success

0/80

Asked in companies

You have been given a number of stairs. Initially, you are at the 0th stair, and you need to reach the Nth stair.

Each time, you can climb either one step or two steps.

Problem approach

Directly solved using Dynamic programming

Try solving now

Round

Medium

HR Round

Duration40 mins

Interview date5 Apr 2023

Coding problem2

It was the last round and was all about Project discussion and HR questions.

1. Project based questions

Q1. Project TechStack and what is the application of the project.
Q2. Discussion about the libraries and functions used in the project.

Problem approach

Tip 1 : Practice about HR questions beforehand so that you don't have to think much about them.
Tip 2 : Have a thorough understanding of your project and the functionality used.
Tip 3 : Have confidence while giving up your answers.