I applied online. The process took 4 weeks. I interviewed at Meta (Palo Alto, CA) in Aug 2024
Interview
The interview process at Meta was structured and thorough. It started with an initial recruiter screen, followed by a technical phone interview focused on data structures and algorithms. After that, I was invited to an onsite loop consisting of five interviews: two coding, one system design, one behavioral, and one focusing on problem-solving. Each interviewer was professional and provided clear instructions. They were also open to clarifying questions. Overall, it was a challenging but fair process.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
They asked me to design a URL shortening service, similar to Bit.ly.
Got a referral through a friend who worked at Meta, which sped up the entire process. After a casual initial chat, I went through a technical interview where I faced a DSA question about validating palindromes. The interviewer was friendly but rigorous. During prep, I had spent time with the coding challenges on PracHub, and it was funny to see a similar palindrome question pop up. Overall, I received an offer, but ultimately decided to decline it after careful consideration.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Given a string s, return true if it can be a palindrome after deleting at most one character (Valid Palindrome II).
Recruiter call was pretty standard, first round was 2 Meta tagged LC mediums in 45 minutes. On-site was 2 coding sessions of 2 LC mediums, a system design interview and a behavioral interview with an engineering manager.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
How do you answer if someone asks how long a deliverable or project will take?
The entire process usually takes 3–8 weeks, depending on scheduling and the specific role. Coding interviews heavily emphasize common DSA topics such as arrays, strings, trees, graphs, BFS/DFS, heaps, hash maps, and dynamic programming. System design becomes increasingly important for E4+ positions.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Given an array of integers and a target value, return the indices of two numbers that add up to the target
