A Guide to the

Android Interview

Applying to our team should be accessible to anyone, so we've put this guide together so you know what to expect during your interview.

 

General Advice

  • Focus on the approach. We’re more interested in seeing how you think about problems rather than whether or not you can solve them.

  • Be your authentic self. We value new perspectives and will do our best to create a comfortable, unstressful environment.

  • Ask questions if you need clarification. It shows that you know how and when to ask for help.

 

Behavioral

The goal of this interview is to better understand you as a person and teammate. We want to learn more about you as a person and how you work in a team setting.

We may ask you to recall a certain situation from your past experiences or describe how you would mediate different conflicts.

Tips for the interview

  • Details of anecdotes aren't as important as talking about your thought process and learnings

 

Technical

Android now offers the choice between two technical interviews: one using native Android and one using Jetpack Compose.

If you’re new to Android Development, we recommend studying for the Compose interview, since that tends to be easier to pick up. The goal of this interview is to simulate the real environment in which you might work as an Android developer so we can better understand how you code and debug.

For the native interview, the first part of this will consist of a debugging challenge; you will be given a simple app and several common bugs in it to fix. Then, you will be asked to complete a few tasks building on top of the starter code. Be prepared to add elements to the user interface (ie. TextView, Button, etc.), set up listeners, and complete some models.

For the Compose interview, you will be given an app and asked to make some small modifications to it, and then to add your own feature to the app. You should make sure you are familiar with the reactive UI paradigm, creating UI using Jetpack Compose, Kotlin syntax, and processing / filtering data.

Tips for the interview

  • Whether you’re preparing for Compose or Native, the best way to prepare tends to be building a small app in Android Studio. This should help you get familiar with Android Development practices.

  • Reviewing the course textbook and completing assignments can help greatly. If you’re preparing for Native, you can used the archive versions of the course in which we taught Native.

  • Explain your thought process while coding so we can understand your problem-solving approach.

  • You are encouraged to use Google and StackOverflow during the interview, but the usage of generative AI is prohibited.

  • If you’re confused about the task, don’t be afraid to ask clarifying questions.