Software Development Engineer I at Amazon
- Difficulty
- Process took
- 2-3 Weeks
- Rounds
- 5
- Format
- Remote
- Applied via
- Company Website
How it went
- For the Amazon SDE-I interview, a strong balance of DSA, leadership principles, and basic system design is key.
- Solve problems in patterns, not just individually. Build the habit of thinking about edge cases naturally.
- When designing, start simple, clear classes, attributes, and relationships first.
- Talk through your approach in interviews, don’t sit silent even if stuck.
What they would tell you
- For the Amazon SDE-I interview, a strong balance of DSA, leadership principles, and basic system design is key.
- Solve problems in patterns, not just individually. Build the habit of thinking about edge cases naturally.
- When designing, start simple, clear classes, attributes, and relationships first.
- Talk through your approach in interviews, don’t sit silent even if stuck.
How to prepare
- Stick to patterns like Stack and Sliding Window.Don't just memorize solutions, practice explaining your logic.
- Focus on using HashMaps, Two Pointers, and understanding when to optimize space/time.
Round by round
- 1
Online Assessment60 min
There were two DSA problems to solve, which went pretty smoothly. Then came the Work Simulation Round, where I had to manage multiple emails, solve real-world problems like a product page not loading, and take quick decisions based on leadership principles. After that, there were some Behavioral Questions in a multiple-choice format, where I had to pick the most likely and least likely responses to different workplace scenarios. Afterwards, I got an email asking me to fill out a survey to move ahead to the next stage.
- 2
DSA60 min
I was given one Graph problem where I had to handle everything, from reading input to printing the final output. The question was somewhat similar to the Evaluate Division problem.
- 3
DSA60 min
It was a fairly easy question, and I was able to solve it without much trouble. After clearing this round, I got a call to schedule my next round on the same day itself.
- 4
System Design60 min
In this round, I was asked to design a bookstore system where there are multiple books, and I had to return the count of a particular word (like some fictional character) from a specific book. I explained how I would define the classes, objects, and methods for it. I structured my solution nicely, and the interviewer looked quite happy with it. After that, we had a good conversation about my past projects, where I shared what problems I solved, my contributions, and the kind of impact my work had.
- 5
DSA and Tech Stack60 min
The interviewer started by asking about my work at my current company, going deep into the tech stack. We discussed that for around 40 minutes. Since there was still some time left, he moved on to a DSA problem. It was a medium-level Sliding Window question, which I had to solve.
What came up
A candidate-reported account, lightly edited. Interview processes change by team and date.