Today we’re going to show you what to expect during Meta (formerly Facebook) software engineer interviews, and what you should do to prepare.
We’ve helped candidates (like Eric H) land software engineer offers at Meta, and here’s one of the first things you’ll want to know:
Array and string questions are BY FAR the most common type of Meta coding interview questions, so you’ll want to make sure that you’re ready for them.
Now let’s dive in (thanks to Pranav and Tom, both ex-engineering managers and interviewers at Meta, for helping us write this guide.)
Note that if you're applying for an engineering manager role, this guide will be more relevant to you. We also have specific guides for the roles of data engineer, front-end engineer, and production engineer.
Click here to practice 1-on-1 with ex-Meta SWE interviewers
1. Meta Software Engineer Role and Salary
Before we dive into the interview process and questions, let’s quickly cover some basics about the role you’re applying for.
1.1 What Does a Meta Software Engineer Do?
Software engineers within Meta have varying functions and roles that revolve around coding, creating, innovating, and solving problems.
Meta software engineers are often involved in developing and maintaining the company’s array of products and platforms, which include Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Meta Quest, and more. They specialize in constructing, analyzing, and enhancing the scalability, efficiency, and stability of Meta’s various systems. Their responsibilities also include product development, data security, data analysis, coding, programming, synchronizing and coordinating server clusters.
As Pranav, ex-engineering manager at Meta explained to us, "Meta is an engineering-driven company and engineers make most of the technical decisions". These decisions often need to be made relatively quickly. The "move fast, break stuff" motto still holds to a large extent and engineers should be able to adjust to changing circumstances and priorities swiftly.
Another thing that makes Meta unique is its bottom-up culture, says Tom. "There is an expectation that you will have a strong level of autonomy, ownership and dealing with ambiguity."
1.2 Meta Software Engineer Salary and Compensation
Meta's competitive salary is among the numerous factors that draw software engineers to the company. Below are the average salaries and compensations for the different software engineer levels at Meta. This is based on the reported data from Levels.fyi.
Meta software engineers generally have a higher base salary and compensation than the software engineers of other big tech companies. According to Glassdoor, the average salary of Meta SWEs is 46% higher than the average salary of other software engineers in the US.
Among the Big 5 tech companies (Meta, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Google), Meta pays the second-highest entry-level salary for software engineers, behind only Google. However, for senior level (L4-L9) software engineers, Meta offers the highest base salary and total compensation. It's also worth noting that Meta’s promotion cycle is faster compared to other companies.The average salary of Meta Software Engineers also varies depending on location or region. For example, a Level 6 Meta SWE in the US has a much higher annual salary than a Level 6 Meta SWE in India.
While we presume that you already know which specific SWE level you are applying for, it’s still good to double-check this with your recruiter. Your recruiter should be able to advise you on which level you’re being evaluated.2. Interview process and timeline
The good news is that Meta is great at sharing how its interviews work, so there's not much mystery. That doesn't mean it's going to be easy though!
Please note that the process outlined below is for E3 and E4 level candidates. If you're interviewing for a more senior individual contributor role, it might change slightly. Check out our guide to Meta E6 interviews for more details.
2.1 What interviews to expect
What's the Meta software engineering interview process and timeline? It takes four to eight weeks on average and follows these steps:
- Resume, cover letter, and referrals
- Recruiter phone screen: one interview
- Technical phone screen: one or two interviews
- Onsite: four or five interviews
Let's look at each of these steps in more detail below:
2.1.1 Resume, cover letter, and referrals
First, recruiters will look at your resume and assess if your experience matches the open position. This is the most competitive step in the process—we’ve found that ~90% of candidates don’t make it past this stage.
So take extra care to tailor your resume to the specific position you're applying to (see our tech resume guide and examples).
If you’re looking for expert feedback, get input from our team of ex-FAANG recruiters, who will cover what achievements to focus on (or ignore), how to fine-tune your bullet points, and more.
2.1.2 Recruiter phone screen
In most cases, you'll start your interview process with Meta by talking to an HR recruiter on the phone. They are looking to confirm that you've got a chance of getting the job at all, so be prepared to explain your background and why you’re a good fit at Meta.
You should expect typical behavioral and resume questions like, "Tell me about yourself", "Why Meta", or "Tell me about your current day-to-day as a developer."
If you get past this first HR screen, the recruiter will then help schedule your first technical screens with a Meta engineer.
One great thing about Meta is that they are very transparent about their recruiting process. Your HR contact will therefore walk you through the remaining steps in the hiring process, and will also share with you a helpful email, listing resources you can use to prepare.
2.1.3 Technical phone screen
You'll go through one or two initial 45mins technical screens which usually happen over the phone. Your interviewers will start with a few behavioral questions but most of the time will be spent on typical coding questions (e.g. data structures, algorithms, etc.)
You'll use a simple online code editor without syntax highlighting or auto-completion for these phone interviews (e.g. CoderPad) and it's a good idea to get used to using one of them beforehand.
Finally, if you live close to a Meta office and are really motivated to join the company you can ask to come onsite for the initial screens. Your recruiter will usually be happy to organize this for you as it's a better experience both for you and your interviewers.
2.1.4 Onsite or "Full Loop" interviews
Onsite interviews are the real test. You'll typically spend a full day at a Meta office and do four or five interviews in total. Each interview will last about 45 minutes. There are three types of onsite interviews.
- 2 x Coding interviews, where you'll solve general coding questions which will typically be harder than in the initial technical screen.
- 1 or 2 x Design interview, where, depending on your background, you'll be asked a system or product design question
- Getting to know you interview, where you can expect behavioral questions as well as questions about your experience and your motivation to work at Meta.
In addition to these interviews, you'll also have lunch with a fellow engineer while you are onsite. The lunch interview is meant to be your time to ask questions about what it's like to work at Meta. The company won't be evaluating you during this time, but we recommend that you behave as if they were.
And as a note, sometimes the onsite step of the interview process is done virtually instead of in-person. Your recruiter can give you more information when you reach this stage.
Click here to download the official Meta Full Loop software engineer interview guide.
2.2 Differences between levels and roles
The process we have described above will vary slightly depending on what level and role you're interviewing for. Here are some of the most common differences you should expect.
2.2.1 Junior vs senior software engineers
The expectations for junior and senior engineers are different.
If you're an entry-level/junior engineer you'll be expected to do extremely well in your coding interviews. But you'll usually only have one design interview where the performance bar will be lower than for more senior candidates.
If you're a senior engineer then you'll both need to do extremely well in coding and design interviews, and you'll probably face two of each.
2.2.2 Individual contributors vs managers
Meta has two career tracks. You can either grow into a manager where you end up leading teams of engineers (management track). Or you can stay very hands-on technically and specialize as you become more senior (individual contributor track).
If you're interviewing as an individual contributor then you should mainly expect technical interviews and will typically only have a single behavioral interview.
If you're interviewing as a manager, director, or above then you may face more than one behavioral interview. Be prepared to answer questions about how you develop people, work with cross-functional teams, execute on projects, grow an organization, etc.
2.3 What happens behind the scenes
Your recruiter is leading the process and taking you from one stage to the next. Here's what happens behind the scenes at each of the stages described above:
- After the Technical phone screen, the interviewers you've talked to have 24h to submit their ratings and notes to the internal system. Your recruiter then reviews the feedback, and decides to move you to the onsite interview or not depending on how well you've done.
- After the Onsite/Full Loop, the interviewers will make a recommendation on hiring you or not and the recruiter compiles your "packet" (interview feedback, resume, referrals, etc.) If they think you can get the job, they will present your case at the next candidate review meeting.
- Candidate review meetings are used to assess all candidates who have recently finished their interview loops and are close to getting an offer. Your packet will be analyzed and possible concerns will be discussed. Your interviewers are invited to join your candidate review meeting, but will usually only attend if there's a strong disagreement in the grades you received (e.g. 2 no hires, 2 hires). If after discussions the team still can't agree whether you should get an offer or not, you might be asked to do a follow-up interview to settle the debate. At the end of the candidate review meeting, a hire / no-hire recommendation is made for consideration by the hiring committee.
- The hiring committee includes senior leaders from across Meta. This step is usually a formality and the committee follows the recommendation of the candidate review meeting. The main focus is on fine-tuning the exact level and therefore compensation you will be offered.
It's also important to note that hiring managers and people who refer you have little influence on the overall process. They can help you get an interview at the beginning but that's about it.
3. Example questions
Here at IGotAnOffer, we believe in data-driven interview preparation.
We've analyzed 170+ software engineer interview questions reported by Meta candidates on Glassdoor, to identify the types of questions which are most frequently asked.
And below, we've provided a curated list of real example questions and free solutions.
For coding interviews, we've broken down the questions you'll be asked into subcategories (e.g. Arrays / Strings, Graphs / Trees, etc.), so that you can prioritize the most common ones in your preparation.
For system design and behavioral questions, we've listed 10 example questions that were frequently reported on Glassdoor.
Let's get into the questions!
3.1 Meta coding interview questions
Meta software engineers solve some of the most difficult problems the company faces with code. It's therefore essential that they have strong problem-solving skills. You'll face two coding interviews at Meta and you'll need to show that you think in a structured way and write code that's accurate, bug-free and fast.
Judging by reports from candidates on Glassdoor, the typical difficulty level is "Leetcode medium" although this may increase you're interviewing at a higher level.
Here are the most common question types asked in Meta coding interviews and their frequency. Please note the list below excludes system/product design and behavioral questions which we cover in the next sections.
- Arrays / Strings (38% of questions, most frequent)
- Graphs / Trees (29%)
- Dynamic Programming (18%)
- Search / Sort (9%)
- Linked lists (4%)
- Stacks / Queues (2%, least frequent)
We've also listed common examples used at Meta for these different question types below. To make these questions easier to study, we've modified the phrasing to match the closest problem on Leetcode or another resource, and we've linked to a free solution.
Finally, we recommend reading this guide on how to answer coding interview questions and practicing with this list of coding interview examples in addition to those listed below.
Meta coding interview question examples (data from Glassdoor.com)
1. Arrays / Strings (38% of questions, most frequent)
- "Given an array
numsof n integers where n > 1, return an arrayoutputsuch thatoutput[i]is equal to the product of all the elements ofnumsexceptnums[i]." (Solution) - "Given a non-empty string
s, you may delete at most one character. Judge whether you can make it a palindrome." (Solution) - "Implement
next permutation, which rearranges numbers into the lexicographically next greater permutation of numbers." (Solution) - "Given a string S and a string T, find the minimum window in S which will contain all the characters in T in complexity O(n)." (Solution)
- "Given an array of strings strs, group the anagrams together." (Solution)
- "Given a string s containing just the characters '(', ')', '{', '}', '[' and ']', determine if the input string is valid." (Solution)
- "Given an array
numsof n integers, are there elements a, b, c innumssuch that a + b + c = 0? Find all unique triplets in the array which gives the sum of zero." (Solution)
2. Graphs / Trees (29%)
- "Given the
rootnode of a binary search tree, return the sum of values of all nodes with value betweenLandR(inclusive)." (Solution) - "Given a Binary Tree, convert it to a Circular Doubly Linked List (In-Place)." (Solution)
- "Implement an iterator over a binary search tree (BST). Your iterator will be initialized with the root node of a BST." (Solution)
- "Given a binary tree, you need to compute the length of the diameter of the tree." (Solution)
- "Serialize and deserialize a binary tree" (Solution)
- "Given a binary tree, find the maximum path sum." (Solution)
- "Given a sorted dictionary (array of words) of an alien language, find order of characters in the language." (Solution)
-
"Check whether a given graph is Bipartite or not" (Solution)
3. Dynamic Programming (18%)
- "Given a list of non-negative numbers and a target integer k, write a function to check if the array has a continuous subarray of size at least 2 that sums up to the multiple of k, that is, sums up to n*k where n is also an integer." (Solution)
-
"Say you have an array for which the ith element is the price of a given stock on day i. If you were only permitted to complete at most one transaction (i.e., buy one and sell one share of the stock), design an algorithm to find the maximum profit." (Solution)
- "Given an input string (
s) and a pattern (p), implement regular expression matching with support for'.'and'*'." (Solution) - "You are given a list of non-negative integers, a1, a2, ..., an, and a target, S. Now you have 2 symbols
+and-. For each integer, you should choose one from+and-as its new symbol. Find out how many ways to assign symbols to make sum of integers equal to target S." (Solution)
4. Search / Sort (9%)
- "We have a list of
pointson the plane. Find theKclosest points to the origin(0, 0)." (Solution) - "Given two arrays, write a function to compute their intersection." (Solution)
- "Given an array of meeting time intervals consisting of start and end times [[s1,e1],[s2,e2],...] find the minimum number of conference rooms required." (Solution)
5. Linked lists (4%)
- "A linked list is given such that each node contains an additional random pointer which could point to any node in the list or null. Return a deep copy of the list." (Solution)
- "Given a singly linked list L: L0?L1?…?Ln-1?Ln, reorder it to: L0?Ln?L1?Ln-1?L2?Ln-2?…" (Solution)
6. Stacks / Queues (2%)
-
"Implement the following operations of a queue using stacks." Note: see more details at the following link. (Solution)
3.2 Meta design interviews (system or product design)
Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp all have 1bn+ monthly active users. Meta engineers therefore need to be able to design systems that are highly scalable and the design interview, consisting of one or two 45-minute conversations, is an important part of the interview process for most (though not all) software engineer candidates.
While you’ll find that most guides and resources usually refer only to '"system design" interviews, Meta makes a distinction and will often offer you the choice between a system design interview and a product design interview.
What’s the difference?
- System design interviews ask you to deal with distributed systems on a very large scale. Think availability, scalability, partition tolerance, reliability, storage, databases, core systems, etc.
- Product design interviews may be more appropriate for candidates who are used to working on a user-facing product. Think APIs, data modeling, how the client and server interact, how a user may interact with it, etc.
Whether you face a system or product design interview, the questions will be very open-ended and feel more like a discussion. You'll therefore want to show that you can both be creative and structured at the same time.
As mentioned previously, if you're a junior developer the expectations will be lower for you than if you're mid-level or senior. In addition, for certain roles (e.g. infrastructure, security, etc.) you will likely have several design interviews.
For a closer look at the system design part of your interview, see our specific guide: Meta system design interview (questions, process, prep). If you've opted for the product design/architecture interview, read our guide on how to crack the Meta product architecture interview.
Here are the most common system and product design questions asked in the Meta interview reports on Glassdoor.
Example system design questions asked at Meta
- How would you design Instagram / Instagram Stories?
- How would you design a messaging app like WhatsApp or Telegram? (watch expert answer)
- How would you design Facebook Messenger?
- How would you design Facebook's live update of comments on posts?
- How would you design an online collaborative editor (e.g. Google Docs)?
- How would you design a typehead feature (e.g. Google search autocomplete)?
- How would you design Twitter's trending topics?
- How would you design a distributed Botnet?
- How would you design a system that can handle millions of card transactions per hour?
- How would you design security for Meta's corporate network from scratch (Security team interview)?
Example product design questions asked at Meta
- Design a service or product API
- Design a chat service or a feed API
- Design an email server
3.3 The Meta "Getting to know you" interview
Meta looks for well-rounded engineers who are proactive and are able to collaborate well with cross-functional partners and teams and the "Getting to know you" interview is where you'll be test on this.
Pranav, ex-Meta engineering manager, told us that Meta looks for the following key behavioral traits in engineers:
- How good are they at resolving conflict with their peers, managers or external teams?
- Do they have a growth mindset? Do they accept feedback openly and work on them to resolve it?
- How well do they deal with ambiguity? How do they bring structure in place when there is none?
- How do they sustain progress despite multiple hurdles?
- How well they are in communicating with peers, cross-functional partners, and the team?
Remember that Meta is a bottom-up environment, and the interviewer wants to see strong levels of autonomy, ownership, and dealing with ambiguity. Come prepared with stories of how you worked through tough situations. As we mentioned previously, if you're applying for a manager position you'll also cover topics such as leading teams, developing talent, managing the day-to-day, etc.
Below we've listed ten frequent behavioral questions that Meta tends to ask, according to data from Glassdoor. For more information, check out our articles on the Meta behavioral interview and the "Why Meta?" question.
Top 10 Getting to know you questions asked at Meta
- Tell me about yourself
- Why /MetaFacebook?
- Tell me about a recent /favorite project and some of the difficulties you had
- Tell me about the greatest accomplishment of your career
- Tell me about a time you struggled to work with one of your colleagues
- Tell me about a time you had to resolve a conflict in a team
- Tell me about a time you were given feedback that was constructive
- Tell me about a time you had to step up and take responsibility for others
- Tell me about a time you struggled on one of your software projects
- Tell me about your worst boss and why they were bad
4. Interviewing tips for Meta SWE interviews
You might be a fantastic software engineer, but unfortunately, that won’t necessarily be enough to ace your interviews at Meta. Interviewing is a skill in itself, that you need to learn.
Let’s look at some key tips to make sure you approach your interviews in the right way.
#Ask clarifying questions
Often the questions you’ll be asked will be quite ambiguous, so make sure you ask questions that can help you clarify and understand the problem. Most of the questions will focus on testing your technical proficiency.
#Be conversational
Meta wants to know if you have excellent communication skills. So make sure you approach the interview like a conversation.
#Think out loud
You need to walk your interviewer through your thought process before you actually start coding or designing a system. Meta also recommends that you talk even while coding as they want to know how you think. Your interviewer may also give you hints about whether you’re on the right track or not.
#State and check assumptions
You need to explicitly state assumptions and check with your interviewer to see if those assumptions are reasonable.
#Present multiple possible solutions
Before you code, present multiple possible solutions if you can. Meta wants to know your reasoning for choosing a certain solution.
#Be honest and authentic
Be genuine in your responses. Meta interviewers appreciate authenticity and honesty. If you faced challenges or setbacks, discuss how you improved and learned from them.
#Center on Meta’s values
Familiarize yourself with Meta’s core values and align your behavioral responses with them. Meta values certain attributes such as passion for technology, collaboration, and focus on the user.
#Brute force, then iterate
When coding, don’t necessarily go for the perfect solution straight away. Meta recommends that you first try and find a solution that works, then iterate to refine your answer.
#Keep your code organized
Make sure to keep your code organized so your interviewer won’t have a hard time understanding what you’ve written. Meta wants to see that your code has captured the right logical structure.
#Get comfortable with coding on various mediums
Meta typically asks interviewees to code in CoderPad.io if the interview is done online. But if the interview is in person, you might be asked to code on paper or a whiteboard. You can check with your recruiter which it will be if you’re not sure which medium to use.
5. How to prepare
Now that you know what questions to expect, let's focus on how to prepare. It's no secret that the performance bar at Meta is high. Some people even go as far as quitting their job to prepare for interviews full-time.
This is extreme and not what we recommend doing, but it shows how much effort some candidates are ready to put in. We've listed the four steps we recommend taking to prepare as efficiently as possible below.
5.1 Learn about Meta's culture
Most candidates fail to do this. But before investing tens of hours preparing for an interview at Meta you should take some time to make sure it's actually the right company for you.
Meta is prestigious and it's therefore tempting to ignore that step completely. But in our experience, the prestige in itself won't make you happy day-to-day. It's the type of work and the people you work with that will.
If you know engineers who work at Meta or used to work there it's a good idea to talk to them to understand what the culture is like. In addition, we would recommend reading about Meta's 6 core values and Facebook's hacker culture.
5.2 Practice by yourself
As mentioned above, you'll have three types of interviews at Meta: coding, system design, and behavioral. The first step of your preparation should be to brush up on these different types of questions and to practice answering them by yourself.
As a starting point, be sure to read Meta's guide to the onsite interview for software engineers. It's packed full of good advice and has some links to useful resources for each of the three interview types.
For coding interviews, we recommend using our FAANG coding interview prep article as your one-stop-shop to guide you through your preparation process.
For system and product design interviews, we recommend studying our system design interview prep guide and learning how to answer system design interview questions. These guides cover a step-by-step method for answering system design questions (equally relevant for product design), and they provide several example questions with solutions.
For getting to know you interviews, we recommend learning our step-by-step method to answer behavioral questions and then practicing the most common software engineer behavioral interview questions.
For Meta interview questions, you can also read this guide on how to answer the top five most common questions.
Finally, a great way to practice coding, system/product design, and behavioral questions, is to interview yourself out loud.
This may sound strange, but it will significantly improve the way you communicate your answers during an interview. Play the role of both the candidate and the interviewer, asking questions and answering them, just like two people would in an interview.
However, by yourself, you can’t simulate thinking on your feet or the pressure of performing in front of a stranger. Plus, there are no unexpected follow-up questions and no feedback.
That’s why many candidates try to practice with friends or peers.
5.3 Practice with peers
If you have friends or peers who can do mock interviews with you, that's an option worth trying. It’s free, but be warned, you may come up against the following problems:
- It’s hard to know if the feedback you get is accurate
- They’re unlikely to have insider knowledge of interviews at your target company
- On peer platforms, people often waste your time by not showing up
For those reasons, many candidates skip peer mock interviews and go straight to mock interviews with an expert.
5.4 Practice with experienced SWE interviewers
In our experience, practicing real interviews with experts who can give you company-specific feedback makes a huge difference.
Find a Meta software engineer interview coach so you can:
- Test yourself under real interview conditions
- Get accurate feedback from a real expert
- Build your confidence
- Get company-specific insights
- Learn how to tell the right stories, better.
- Save time by focusing your preparation
Landing a job at a big tech company often results in a $50,000 per year or more increase in total compensation. In our experience, three or four coaching sessions worth ~$500 make a significant difference in your ability to land the job. That’s an ROI of 100x!
