Paytm interview experience Real time questions & tips from candidates to crack your interview
Software Engineer Intern
Paytm
2 rounds | 2 Coding
problems
Selected Interview preparation journey
Journey
I am a final-year Electrical Engineering student at MNNIT Allahabad. My placement journey started at the beginning of my third year. Since I didn’t have any internship in my second year, I felt very uncertain and demotivated. Instead of giving up, I focused on improving my skills.
I started doing competitive programming regularly and worked on some good projects. For DSA, I followed Striver’s A2Z sheet and Coding Ninjas. I also gave many mock interviews to build confidence. Gradually, things started improving.
My advice to others is simple: stay consistent, keep learning, and don’t compare your journey with others. Hard work eventually pays off.
Application story
I applied for the role through the on-campus placement process at MNNIT Allahabad. The company visited our campus, and applications were submitted through the institute’s placement portal. After shortlisting based on resumes and eligibility criteria, selected candidates were invited to participate in the recruitment process.
I focused on maintaining a strong resume with good projects and solid DSA preparation, which helped me get shortlisted. After clearing the different stages of the hiring process, I was selected for the role.
Prior to this, I had also completed an internship with Paytm from January to June 2026, where I worked on backend services and internal tools, which strengthened my practical experience.
Why selected/rejected for the role?
I believe I was selected because of my consistent preparation in DSA, strong problem-solving skills developed through competitive programming, and relevant projects that demonstrated my practical understanding. Mock interviews also helped me communicate my thought process clearly.
My internship experience and consistent practice helped me stay confident throughout the process. I learned that consistency and strong fundamentals play a very important role in getting selected.
Preparation
Duration: 6 Months
Topics: Data Structures and Algorithms, OOPs, DBMS, Operating Systems, Computer Networks, SOLID principles, Dynamic Programming, Graphs, Arrays, Strings, Hashing
Tip 1: Practice DSA consistently and revise important concepts regularly.
Tip 2: Give mock interviews to improve confidence and identify weak areas.
Tip 3: Build at least 2–3 strong projects to showcase practical skills.
Application process
Where: Campus
Eligibility: 7.5+ CGPA, (Salary: 30000/month)
Tip 1: Highlight strong projects and clearly explain your contributions.
Tip 2: Keep your resume concise (one page) and include only the skills you are confident about.
Interview rounds
01
Round
Medium
Face to Face
Duration55 minutes
Interview date9 Oct 2025
Coding problem1
The interview was conducted in a calm and professional environment. The interviewer was friendly and focused mainly on my projects and problem-solving ability. The round started with a discussion of the projects mentioned in my resume, especially my Rubik’s Cube Solver and Placement Tracking Platform. The interviewer asked questions related to graph traversal algorithms, such as DFS, BFS, and IDDFS, used in my project.
After the project discussion, the interviewer asked a DSA question and requested me to dry-run it with multiple test cases. The interviewer also asked conceptual questions related to data optimization, indexing, unordered sets, and core OOPs concepts like encapsulation and abstraction. Overall, the interview focused on assessing my fundamentals and practical knowledge from projects.
The interviewer was supportive and encouraged me to explain my thought process clearly.
1. Maximum Product Subarray
Moderate
25m average time
75% success
0/80
Asked in companies
You are given an array “arr'' of integers. Your task is to find the contiguous subarray within the array which has the largest product of its elements. You have to report this maximum product.
An array c is a subarray of array d if c can be obtained from d by deletion of several elements from the beginning and several elements from the end.
For e.g.- The non-empty subarrays of an array [1,2,3] will be- [1],[2],[3],[1,2],[2,3],[1,2,3].
For Example:
If arr = {-3,4,5}.
All the possible non-empty contiguous subarrays of “arr” are {-3}, {4}, {5}, {-3,4}, {4,5} and {-3,4,5}.
The product of these subarrays are -3, 4, 5, -12, 20 and -60 respectively.
The maximum product is 20. Hence, the answer is 20.
Follow Up:
Can you solve this in linear time and constant space complexity?
Problem approach
Step 1 : I first carefully understood the problem and identified that the task was to find the maximum product of a contiguous subarray. I realized that negative numbers could flip the product sign, so a simple greedy approach would not work.
Step 2 : I initially thought about checking the product of all possible subarrays, but that would take O(n²) time which is not optimal.
Step 3 : Then I used an optimized approach where I tracked both the maximum product and minimum product at each index, because a negative number can turn the minimum product into the maximum.
Step 4 : While traversing the array, for each element I updated the current maximum and minimum product and kept updating the global maximum product.
Step 5 : Finally, I dry ran the algorithm on multiple test cases including arrays with negative numbers and zeros to verify correctness.
02
Round
Medium
Face to Face
Duration35 minutes
Interview date9 Oct 2025
Coding problem1
The second round started with a brief introduction. The interviewer asked about the projects mentioned in my resume and which one I was most comfortable explaining. I chose my Placement Tracking Platform project and explained its architecture and features.
The interviewer then asked backend and database-related questions based on my project. I was asked to design a MongoDB schema for the platform and write some related queries. The discussion also included database concepts like normalization and how SQL commands such as LIMIT and OFFSET are internally executed in MySQL.
Later, the interviewer asked system design and backend-related questions, such as how servers handle multiple users accessing them simultaneously and how recommendation systems like Google Search work. Some networking questions, such as HTTP vs HTTPS, JWT authentication, and what happens when we type a URL like google.com in a browser, were also asked.
The interviewer was friendly and mainly evaluated my conceptual understanding and practical knowledge related to backend development and databases.
1. Backend Questions
- Tell me about yourself.
- Explain the projects mentioned in your resume.
- Which project are you most comfortable with? Explain it in detail.
- Design a MongoDB schema for your project.
- Write a query related to your project’s database.
- What happens if many users try to access the same server at the same time?
- Write a SQL query using LIMIT and OFFSET, and explain how MySQL internally executes it.
- How does Google Search work? Explain the idea of a recommendation/search system.
- What is data normalization?
- What is the difference between abstraction and interface? Explain with a practical example.
- If the IP address of a server changes, what will happen to the website currently being accessed?
- What is JWT (JSON Web Token)?
- What is the difference between HTTP and HTTPS? (Learn)
- What happens internally when we type google.com in a browser?
Problem approach
Tip 1: Know your projects very well. Most interviews start with project discussions, so be ready to explain the architecture, database schema, and design decisions.
Tip 2: Prepare DBMS concepts such as normalization, indexing, schema design, joins, LIMIT/OFFSET, and how databases execute queries internally.
Tip 3: Understand backend fundamentals such as authentication (JWT), handling multiple requests on a server, and API design.
Tip 4: Revise computer network basics such as DNS, HTTP vs HTTPS, what happens when you type a URL, and client-server communication.
Tip 5: Practice explaining concepts clearly with examples, as interviewers often assess how well you communicate technical ideas.
Here's your problem of the day 
Solving this problem will increase your chance to get selected in this company
Skill covered: Programming
Which traversal uses a queue as its primary data structure?
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