Amazon software development engineer (SDE) interviews are difficult, and they only get harder with each level. For the Amazon SDE 2 role, you’ll go through multiple rounds of interviews where you’ll be tested on the core capabilities of your mid-level software engineer role.
But before we jump into more detail, here’s one of the first things you should know:
Candidates often under-prepare for questions relating to Amazon’s Leadership Principles. This is a huge mistake, as Amazon places much more emphasis on its behavioral questions than other tech companies do.
Keep that in mind as you read the rest of this guide.
Here's an overview of everything we cover:
- Role and salary
- Interview process and timeline
- Example interview questions
- Interviewing tips
- Preparation plan
NOTE: We have separate guides for Amazon software development engineers (SDE), Amazon software development managers (SDM), Amazon machine learning engineers, and Amazon data engineers, so take a look at those articles if they’re more relevant to you.
Click here to practice 1-on-1 with ex-Amazon SDE interviewers
1. Amazon SDE 2 role, level, and salary
Before we cover your Amazon SDE 2 interview questions, let’s take a look at the role first.
1.1 What does an Amazon SDE 2 do?
As an Amazon SDE 2, you occupy a mid-level engineering position where you are responsible for designing, building, and maintaining Amazon’s software systems.
At this level, you are expected to operate more independently, take ownership of complex components assigned to you by your seniors, and contribute to the technical direction of your team or projects.
On the hierarchy of Amazon software developer levels, you fall between SDE 1 (entry level) and Senior SDE (senior level), as you can see below:
While you’re not yet a people manager at this level, you will be seen as a tech lead for specific projects or services. You will naturally have more leadership responsibilities than your less experienced entry-level colleagues.
On a day-to-day basis, your core responsibilities include:
- Design scalable and maintainable systems that align with long-term goals. This includes designing solutions that enhance existing features and enable new ones.
- Write and maintain high-quality production code with minimal oversight.
- Own end-to-end delivery of features, including design, implementation, testing, and deployment.
- Troubleshoot and optimize complex systems to ensure performance and reliability.
- Document how your team’s software is made, operated, tested, secured, and how it fits into the bigger picture. You’ll use this data to align with stakeholders and ensure solutions deliver real value.
- Mentor junior engineers and contribute to raising the team’s technical bar.
As an Amazon SDE 2 candidate, you are evaluated on your ability to exercise leadership without senior authority, your technical depth, and your ability to deliver results on loosely scoped problems.
1.2 How much does an Amazon SDE 2 make?
According to Levels.fyi, the median total compensation for Amazon Software Development Engineers in the United States is $280K, based on July 2025 figures.
Ultimately, how you do in your interviews will help determine what you’ll be offered. That’s why hiring one of our Amazon SDE interview coaches can provide such a significant return on investment.
And remember, compensation packages are always negotiable, even at Amazon.
So, if you do get an offer, don’t be afraid to ask for more. If you need help negotiating, consider booking one of our salary negotiation coaches to get expert advice. You can also read our guide to Amazon offer negotiations.
2. Amazon SDE 2 interview process and timeline
The Amazon software development engineer (SDE) interview process takes about four to eight weeks on average. Below we’ve outlined the steps you can expect, and how Amazon evaluates interviews and decides on a hire.
2.1 What interviews to expect
First, it's important that you understand the different stages of your software engineer interview process with Amazon. Note that the process at AWS follows similar steps.
Here’s what you can expect:
2.1.1 Resume screening
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 software developer resume guide and Amazon resume guide for tips 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 screening
Based on the official interview guide, if you pass the resume screening, you should receive an email with a link to an online assessment, which we’ll cover below. But based on candidate experience, some still do receive a call.
During this call, the recruiter will discuss your interests to determine which team you may be the best fit for, and to confirm that you've got a chance of landing the job at all.
During this interview, be prepared to explain your background and why you’re a good fit for Amazon.
2.1.3 Online assessments
After passing the resume screen and HR screen, you’ll receive a link to a self-administered online assessment via email. It expires after a week.
Based on Amazon’s interview guide for SDE 2, your online assessment may consist of three parts:
- Coding (90 minutes): This part is strictly timed, so make sure you keep an eye on your clock. During this assessment, you can choose among the following coding languages: C, C++, C++14, C#, Go, Java7, Java8, JavaScript, Kotlin, Objective-C, PyPy2, PyPy3, Python2, Python3, Ruby, Scala, and Swift.
- System design (20 minutes): For this part, you don’t need to complete a whiteboarding or diagram exercise. For each system design scenario, you’ll be asked to rate actions from most to least effective.
- Surveys: After completing the system design assessment, you’ll be asked to fill in the Work Style Survey, which will assess your work style via statements. This is heavily based on Amazon’s Leadership Principles.
One interview candidate reports receiving a Work Sample Simulation along with the Work Style Survey. The simulation is a “day in the life” type of activity.
During this activity, your prompts may come in the form of emails, videos, or instant messages from a virtual manager or team member. You will then be given a set of responses to choose from. You’ll also receive materials to inform your decision.
This tests you on your problem-solving skills, in alignment with Amazon’s Leadership Principles.
If you pass the online assessment, you can expect a 15-minute preparation session on Amazon Chime, the company's video conferencing product. Your recruiter will brief you on the rest of the interviews you can expect. They’ll also give you a list of software development topics to prepare for.
2.1.4 Interview loop
After you pass the online assessments, the next step is the interview loop. For this round, you'll have a day packed with 4 interviews, which may be done virtually or in-person at an Amazon office.
Each interview will last about 55 minutes and is a one-on-one session with a mix of people from the team you’re applying to join, including peers, the hiring manager, and a senior executive.
Here’s a sample interview schedule from Amazon’s interview prep guide to give you an idea of what the interview loop looks like:
- Three to four of your interviews will include coding questions (i.e., data structure and algorithm questions), which you'll need to solve on a whiteboard/online editor. One interview will cover system design questions.
- You'll be asked some behavioral questions in all your interviews. Each interviewer is usually assigned two to three of Amazon’s Leadership Principles to focus on during your interview.
- All candidates are expected to do extremely well in both coding and behavioral questions.
Like we’ve mentioned, remember that behavioral questions are much more important at Amazon than they are at other big tech companies like Google or Meta.
Finally, keep in mind that one of your interviews will be with what Amazon calls a “Bar Raiser.” Bar Raisers get special training to make sure Amazon’s hiring standards stay high and don’t degrade over time, so they are a big barrier between you and the job offer.
You will not be informed which interviewer occupies this role, but they will typically not be associated with the team you’re applying for, and focus more on overall candidate quality than specific team needs.
You can learn more about Amazon Bar Raiser interviews here.
2.2 What the Amazon interview evaluation form looks like
At the end of each interview, your interviewer will grade your performance using a standardized feedback form that summarizes the attributes Amazon looks for in a candidate. The form is constantly evolving, but we have listed some of its main components below.
A) Notes
The interviewer will file the notes they took during the interview. This usually includes the questions they asked, a summary of your answers, and any additional impressions they had (e.g., communicated ABC well, weak knowledge of XYZ, etc.).
B) Technical competencies
Your interviewer will then grade you on your technical competencies. They will be trying to determine whether you are "raising the bar" or not for each competency they have tested.
In other words, you'll need to convince them that you are at least as good as or better than the average current Amazon SDE II level that you're applying for.
According to Amazon’s official SDE 2 interview guide, you’ll be evaluated on the following technical competencies.
For coding interviews:
- Data structures and algorithms
- Problem-solving
- Logical and maintainable coding
For system design interviews:
- Software systems and your working knowledge of design patterns
- Scalability concepts and technologies
- Distributed systems, SOA, and n-tiered software architecture
C) Leadership principles
Your interviewer will also grade you on Amazon's Leadership Principles and assess whether you're "raising the bar" for those, too. As mentioned above, each interviewer is given two or three Leadership Principles to grill you on. We cover these in detail in section 3.
D) Overall recommendation
Finally, each interviewer will file an overall recommendation into the system. The different options are along the lines of: "Strong hire", "Hire", "No hire", and "Strong no hire.”
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 at each of the stages described above:
- After the online assessments, your recruiter decides to move you to the interview loop or not, depending on how well you've done.
- After the interview loop, each interviewer files their notes into the internal system, grades you and makes a hiring recommendation (i.e., "Strong hire", "Hire", "No hire", "Strong no hire").
- The "Debrief" brings all your interviewers together and is led by the Bar Raiser, who is usually the most experienced interviewer and is also not part of the hiring team. The Bar Raiser will try to guide the group toward a hiring decision. It's rare, but they can also veto hiring even if all other interviewers want to hire you.
- You get an offer. If everything goes well, the recruiter will then give you an offer, usually within a week of the onsite, but it can sometimes take longer.
It's also important to note that recruiters 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. Amazon SDE 2 example interview questions
Here at IGotAnOffer, we believe in data-driven interview preparation and have used Glassdoor data to identify the types of questions that are most frequently asked at Amazon. Here are the three types of interview questions you should be prepared for with the SDE 2 role:
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.
3.1 Coding interview
Amazon software development engineers solve some of the most difficult problems the company faces with code. It's therefore essential that they have strong problem-solving skills.
This is the part of the interview where you want to show that you think in a structured way, and can write code that's accurate, bug-free, and fast.
Here are the common question types asked in Amazon coding interviews:
- Graphs / Trees
- Arrays / Strings
- Linked lists
- Search / Sort
- Stacks & Queues
- Hash tables
According to Glassdoor reports, the coding interview questions for SDE 2 candidates range from medium to hard LeetCode questions.
Here are some sample coding questions. We've modified some phrasing to match the closest LeetCode problem and linked to some free solutions.
Example Amazon Software Development Engineer coding questions
1. Graphs / Trees
- “Given the root of a binary tree, return the zigzag level order traversal of its nodes' values. (i.e., from left to right, then right to left for the next level and alternate between).” (Solution)
- "Given a non-empty binary tree, find the maximum path sum. For this problem, a path is defined as any sequence of nodes from some starting node to any node in the tree along the parent-child connections. The path must contain at least one node and does not need to go through the root." (Solution)
- "Design an algorithm to serialize and deserialize a binary tree. There is no restriction on how your serialization/deserialization algorithm should work. You just need to ensure that a binary tree can be serialized to a string and this string can be deserialized to the original tree structure." (Solution)
- "Given a list of airline tickets represented by pairs of departure and arrival airports [from, to], reconstruct the itinerary in order. All of the tickets belong to a man who departs from JFK. Thus, the itinerary must begin with JFK." (Solution)
- "There are a total of n courses you have to take, labelled from 0 to n-1. Some courses may have prerequisites; for example, if prerequisites[i] = [ai, bi], this means you must take the course bi before the course ai. Given the total number of courses numCourses and a list of the prerequisite pairs, return the ordering of courses you should take to finish all courses." (Solution)
2. Arrays / Strings
- “Given an array of strings words and an integer k, return the k most frequent strings. Return the answer sorted by the frequency from highest to lowest. Sort the words with the same frequency by their lexicographical order.” (Solution)
- “Convert a non-negative integer num to its English words representation.” (Solution)
- “Given an array of lockers (0 = empty, 1 = occupied), find the maximum distance to the nearest 1. Modify the problem to place k packages instead of one, maximizing the minimum distance. Follow-up: Optimize for O(1) space complexity and reduce O(n log n) sorting overhead.” (Solution)
- “You are given an m x n matrix of characters, boxGrid representing a side-view of a box. Return an n x m matrix representing the box after the rotation described.” (Solution)
3. Linked lists
- "Given a linked list, reverse the nodes of a linked list k at a time and return its modified list. k is a positive integer and is less than or equal to the length of the linked list. If the number of nodes is not a multiple of k then left-out nodes in the end should remain as it is." (Solution)
- "You are given an array of k linked-lists lists, each linked-list is sorted in ascending order. Merge all the linked-lists into one sorted linked-list and return it." (Solution)
- "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)
4. Search / Sort
- “Use priority queue to find the kth minimum element.” (Solution)
- "Given an array of integers nums, sort the array in ascending order." (Solution)
- "Given a 2d grid map of '1's (land) and '0's (water), count the number of islands. An island is surrounded by water and is formed by connecting adjacent lands horizontally or vertically. You may assume all four edges of the grid are all surrounded by water." (Solution)
- "Given an array of meeting time intervals consisting of start and end times [[s1,e1],[s2,e2],...] (si < ei), find the minimum number of conference rooms required." (Solution)
5. Stacks / Queues
- “Given a circular integer array nums (i.e., the next element of nums[nums.length - 1] is nums[0]), return the next greater number for every element in nums.” (Solution)
- “Implement a stack using a queue algorithm.” (Solution)
- "Design a stack that supports push, pop, top, and retrieving the minimum element in constant time." (Solution)
- "Given n non-negative integers representing an elevation map where the width of each bar is 1, compute how much water it is able to trap after raining." (Solution)
6. Hash tables
- "Given a non-empty 2D array grid of 0's and 1's, an island is a group of 1's (representing land) connected 4-directionally (horizontal or vertical.) You may assume all four edges of the grid are surrounded by water. Count the number of distinct islands. An island is considered to be the same as another if and only if one island can be translated (and not rotated or reflected) to equal the other." (Solution)
- "Given a non-empty list of words, return the k most frequent elements. Your answer should be sorted by frequency from highest to lowest. If two words have the same frequency, then the word with the lower alphabetical order comes first." (Solution)
We recommend reading our guide on how to answer coding interview questions for a step-by-step approach to solving these questions. You can also practice with more questions using our list of 49 recent Amazon coding interview questions.
Finally, you can also watch Amazon’s video about how to navigate its coding assessment platform.
3.2 System design questions
Amazon products are used by millions of users daily. Therefore, Amazon SDEs need to be able to design highly scalable systems.
The coding questions we covered above usually have a single optimal solution. But for system design questions, you'll typically be asked more open-ended questions.
During this interview, you’ll want to show that you can be both creative and structured. In most cases, your interviewer will adapt the question to your background.
For instance, if you've worked on an API product, they'll ask you to design an API. But that won't always be the case, so you should be ready to design any type of product or system at a high level.
For certain roles where system design is particularly important (e.g., infrastructure, security, etc.), you’ll likely have several system design interviews instead of just one.
Amazon recommends brushing up your knowledge of distributed systems, SOA, and n-tiered software architecture for this section. Also, practice drawing by hand and be prepared for a whiteboard-style presentation.
Below are the most common system design questions, according Glassdoor reports.
Example system design questions asked at Amazon
- Design a/an:
- Warehouse system for Amazon
- New Amazon website so that it can handle 10x more traffic than today
- Amazon's front page (include featured items that change dynamically based on previous searches and popularity)
- Online bookstore, with separate entities for authors and books
- Parking lot system (three floors and two vehicle sizes, big and small; small ones fit into big spots, but big ones can't take small spots)
- System allowing users to browse and book hotels (users should be able to search available rooms based on locations or hotel names)
- Rate limiter for an API that supports millions of requests per second
- System that scrapes prices for products across the web
- Product recommendation system for e-commerce
- Your favorite social media platform
- Music player application
- Email application
For more information, we recommend watching Amazon’s video guide on prepping for system design interviews. You can also practice with more sample questions from our general list of 31 system design questions and Amazon-specific system design questions.
3.3 Behavioral questions
Amazon looks for candidates who embody the company’s Leadership Principles. They test this through behavioral questions, which you'll be asked in every interview.
According to Amazon ex-interviewers on our coaching team, your SDE interviews tend to focus on the first four principles in the list below. The other twelve topics also come up, but less frequently.
Amazon's 16 Leadership Principles
- Customer obsession
- Ownership
- Bias for action
- Have backbone; disagree and commit
- Invent and simplify
- Dive deep
- Are right, a lot
- Deliver results
- Think big
- Hire and develop the best
- Frugality
- Learn and be curious
- Insist on the highest standards
- Earn trust
- Strive to be Earth's best employer
- Success and scale bring broad responsibility
When answering these questions, Amazon recommends using the STAR method to lay out your response. Many SDE 2 candidates on Glassdoor also report being asked to use this framework.
Below, we break down each leadership principle and list sample questions you may encounter. All definitions are from Amazon’s official Leadership Principles.
3.3.1 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Customer obsession
Customer obsession: "Leaders start with the customer and work backwards. They work vigorously to earn and keep customer trust. Although leaders pay attention to competitors, they obsess over customers.”
Customer obsession is about empathy. Interviewers want to see that you understand the consequences that every decision has on customer experience. You need to know who the customer is and their underlying needs, not just the tasks they want done.
This is by far the most important leadership principle at Amazon. Therefore, it is the most critical one to prepare for.
Example "customer obsession" questions asked by Amazon
- Tell me about a time you had to deal with a difficult customer
- Tell me about a time you made something much simpler for customers.
- Which company has the best customer service and why?
- Tell me about a time you said no to a customer request and why.
According to Bilwasiva, an Amazon interview coach, here are the best ways to answer ‘customer obsession’ questions:
- Provide examples of how you've prioritized customer needs in your previous roles, showcasing your commitment to understanding and addressing customer pain points.
- Discuss specific initiatives or projects where you've gone above and beyond to deliver exceptional customer experiences, highlighting the outcomes and impact.
3.3.2 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Ownership
Ownership: "Leaders are owners. They think long-term and don’t sacrifice long-term value for short-term results. They act on behalf of the entire company, beyond just their team. They never say, ‘That’s not my job.’”
Interviewers at Amazon want to avoid hiring people who are not willing to go above and beyond for their jobs. When answering ownership questions, you’ll want to prove that you take initiative, are able to make tough decisions, and take responsibility for your mistakes.
Dessy, an ex-Amazon interviewer, advises presenting an answer that shows how you’ve taken ownership of a project, even if you worked cross-functionally, and how you’ve gone above and beyond to follow through and deliver.
Example "ownership" questions asked by Amazon
- Tell me about a time you did something at work that wasn't your responsibility / in your job description
- Describe an instance where you had to make an important decision without approval from your boss.
- Tell me about a time you took ownership of a problem that was not the focus of your organization.
- When was the last time that you sacrificed a long-term value to complete a short-term task?
3.3.3 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Bias for action
Bias for action: "Speed matters in business. Many decisions and actions are reversible and do not need extensive study. We value calculated risk-taking.”
Since Amazon likes to ship quickly, they also prefer to learn from doing (while also measuring results) vs. performing user research and making projections. They want to see that you can take calculated risks and move things forward.
Bilwasiva advises preparing examples that “emphasize the importance of learning from failures, and iterating on ideas to continuously improve and move forward.”
Example "bias for action" questions asked by Amazon
- Tell me about a time you had to change your approach because you were going to miss a deadline.
- Tell me about a time you had to make a decision with incomplete information. How did you make it, and what was the outcome?
- Tell me about a time when you launched a feature with known risks.
- Tell me about a time you broke a complex problem into simple sub-parts.
3.3.4 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Have backbone, disagree and commit
Have backbone; disagree and commit: "Leaders are obligated to respectfully challenge decisions when they disagree, even when doing so is uncomfortable or exhausting. Leaders have conviction and are tenacious. They do not compromise for the sake of social cohesion. Once a decision is determined, they commit wholly.”
Any group of intelligent leaders will disagree at some point. Amazon wants to see that you know when to challenge ideas and escalate problems to senior leadership.
At the same time, they’ll want to know you can also sense when it’s the right time to move forward, regardless of your disagreement.
Example "have backbone; disagree and commit" questions asked by Amazon
- Tell me about a time you disagreed with your team and convinced them to change their position
- Tell me about a time you had a conflict with your team but decided to go ahead with their proposal.
- Tell me about a feature that you received pushback on, and how you handled it.
3.3.5 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Invent and simplify
Invent and simplify: "Leaders expect and require innovation and invention from their teams and always find ways to simplify. They are externally aware, look for new ideas from everywhere, and are not limited by 'not invented here.’ Because we do new things, we accept that we may be misunderstood for long periods of time.”
Amazon relies on a culture of innovation. This is your opportunity to show your ability to create solutions when there is no obvious answer.
You’ll also want to show that you know how to execute big ideas as simply and cheaply as possible.
“Think about examples where you've come up with innovative, alternative solutions instead of building a feature that required engineering resources,” Dessy says.
Example "invent and simplify" questions asked by Amazon
- Tell me about a time you suggested a new approach.
- Tell me how you built a feature in an innovative way, give specific details.
- Give me an example of a complex problem you solved with a simple solution.
3.3.6 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Dive deep
Dive deep: "Leaders operate at all levels, stay connected to the details, audit frequently, and are skeptical when metrics and anecdote differ. No task is beneath them.”
When something isn’t working, SDE 2s need to quickly find a solution. Interviewers want to see that you are excited to dive deep when problems arise.
Example "dive deep" questions asked by Amazon
- Tell me about a project in which you had to deep dive into analysis.
- Tell me about the most complex problem you have worked on.
- Describe an instance when you used a lot of data in a short period of time.
3.3.7 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Are right, a lot
Are right, a lot: "Leaders are right a lot. They have strong judgment and good instincts. They seek diverse perspectives and work to disconfirm their beliefs.”
Amazon expects its Software Development Engineers to produce solutions as quickly as possible and to make a lot of decisions with little information.
You’ll want to demonstrate skill in taking calculated risks and show that you're comfortable disproving your own opinions before moving ahead.
Example "are right, a lot" questions asked by Amazon
- Tell me how you deal with ambiguity.
- Describe a time you made a mistake.
- Tell me about a time you applied judgment to a decision when data was not available.
- Tell me about a time you had very little information about a project but still had to move forward.
3.3.8 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Deliver results
Deliver results: "Leaders focus on the key inputs for their business and deliver them with the right quality and in a timely fashion. Despite setbacks, they rise to the occasion and never settle.”
Amazon values action over perfection. When answering questions related to delivering results, you’ll want to indicate that you dislike slipped deadlines and failed goals.
Example "deliver results" questions asked by Amazon
- Tell me about the most challenging project you ever worked on.
- Talk about a technical challenge where you had to deep dive and deliver under pressure.
- Tell me about a time when you had to work on a tight deadline.
3.3.9 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Think big
Think big: "Thinking small is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Leaders create and communicate a bold direction that inspires results. They think differently and look around corners for ways to serve customers.”
Amazon is huge, and SDE 2s need to build products that reach significant scale to make a difference for the business. As a result, interviewers will want to see that you can develop and articulate a bold vision.
To demonstrate your ability to ‘think big’, Bilwasiva says: “Share examples of how you've challenged the status quo, pursued innovative ideas, and inspired others to think beyond conventional boundaries.”
Example "think big" questions asked by Amazon
- Describe a time you proposed a non-intuitive solution to a problem and how you identified that it required a different way of thinking
- Give a specific example where you drove adoption for your vision and explain how you knew it had been adopted by others
- Tell me about your most significant accomplishment. Why was it significant?
3.3.10 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Hire and develop the best
Hire and develop the best: "Leaders raise the performance bar with every hire and promotion. They recognize exceptional talent, and willingly move them throughout the organization. Leaders develop leaders and take seriously their role in coaching others. We work on behalf of our people to invent mechanisms for development like Career Choice.”
As mentioned above, Amazon wants new hires to “raise the bar.” Interviewers will want to see that you are not afraid of working with and hiring people smarter than you.
You should also show that you enjoy coaching younger colleagues and know how to get the most out of top performers. You’ll notice the examples listed here are general interview questions, but they provide a perfect opportunity for you to address this principle.
This leadership principle is typically discussed in interviews for senior engineering positions that involve people management or building a team, but it wouldn’t hurt to prep for them just in case.
Example "hire and develop the best" questions asked by Amazon
- Describe a time you stepped in to help a struggling teammate
- Tell me about a time you helped boost your team morale
- Tell me about a time you hired or worked with people smarter than you are
- Why do you want to work at Amazon?
3.3.11 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Frugality
Frugality: "Accomplish more with less. Constraints breed resourcefulness, self-sufficiency, and invention. There are no extra points for growing headcount, budget size, or fixed expense.”
At every touchpoint, Amazon tries to provide customers with as much value for as little cost as possible.
Interviewers will be looking for how you can support this idea while maintaining a constant drive for innovation.
Example "frugality" questions asked by Amazon
- Tell me about a time you successfully delivered a project without a budget or resources.
- Describe the last time you figured out a way to keep an approach simple or to save on expenses.
3.3.12 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Learn and be curious
Learn and be curious: "Leaders are never done learning and always seek to improve themselves. They are curious about new possibilities and act to explore them.”
Amazon demands constant improvement in every part of its business. You’ll want to show that you’re interested in learning new things and exploring new ideas.
Some examples listed here are general interview questions, but they provide a perfect opportunity for you to address this principle.
Example "learn and be curious" questions asked by Amazon
- Explain something interesting you’ve learned recently.
- Tell me about a time you taught yourself a skill.
- Why software engineering?
3.3.13 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Insist on the highest standards
Insist on the highest standards: "Leaders have relentlessly high standards — many people may think these standards are unreasonably high. Leaders are continually raising the bar and drive their teams to deliver high-quality products, services, and processes. Leaders ensure that defects do not get sent down the line and that problems are fixed so they stay fixed.”
Amazon takes the view that nothing is ever “good enough.” They’d like to see that you push for standards that are difficult to meet.
To demonstrate your commitment to high standards, Bilwasiva suggests citing examples from your previous roles where you established processes, guidelines, and quality assurance measures to uphold standards and drive continuous improvement.
Example "Insist on the highest standards" questions asked by Amazon
- Describe a project that you wish you had done better and how you would do it differently today.
- Tell me about the most successful project you've done.
- How do you ensure standards are met when delivering projects?
3.3.14 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Earn trust
Earn trust: "Leaders listen attentively, speak candidly, and treat others respectfully. They are vocally self-critical, even when doing so is awkward or embarrassing. Leaders do not believe their or their team’s body odor smells of perfume. They benchmark themselves and their teams against the best."
The key part of that principle that candidates often miss is the “vocally self-critical” bit. Amazon wants SDE 2s who focus on fixing mistakes, instead of figuring out who to blame.
You’ll want to show that you take action when something is wrong and acknowledge your own faults before blaming others.
Bilwasiva also advises discussing “your approach to building relationships based on mutual respect, open communication, and delivering on promises.”
Example "earn trust" questions asked by Amazon
- How do you earn trust with a team?
- Tell me a piece of difficult feedback you received and how you handled it
- A co-worker constantly arrives late to a recurring meeting. What would you do?
3.3.15 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Strive to be Earth's best employer
Strive to be Earth's best employer: "Leaders work every day to create a safer, more productive, higher performing, more diverse, and more just work environment. They lead with empathy, have fun at work, and make it easy for others to have fun. Leaders ask themselves: Are my fellow employees growing? Are they empowered? Are they ready for what's next? Leaders have a vision for and commitment to their employees' personal success, whether that be at Amazon or elsewhere.”
Similar to the principle “hire and develop the best,” this principle is more likely to come up in interviews for senior and/or managerial positions.
In this case, you’ll want to show that you’ll not only elevate your team but also create a safe, diverse, and just work environment.
Essentially, if “hire and develop the best” means picking and training a top team, being “Earth’s best employer” means keeping that team safe, enriched, and engaged once you’ve got them.
Example "Strive to be Earth's best employer" questions asked by Amazon
- Tell me about a time that you went above and beyond for an employee
- Tell me about a time you saw an issue that would negatively impact your team. How did you deal with it?
- How do you manage a low performer in the team? How do you identify a good performer in the team and help in their career growth?
3.3.16 Amazon’s 16 Leadership Principles: Success and scale bring broad responsibility
Success and scale bring broad responsibility: "We started in a garage, but we're not there anymore. We are big, we impact the world, and we are far from perfect. We must be humble and thoughtful about even the secondary effects of our actions. Our local communities, planet, and future generations need us to be better every day. We must begin each day with a determination to make better, do better, and be better for our customers, our employees, our partners, and the world at large. And we must end every day knowing we can do even more tomorrow. Leaders create more than they consume and always leave things better than how they found them.”
Amazon wants its employees to understand the responsibility of working for a vast, impactful company.
Show how you measure the impact of your decisions, both in your workspace and in the world around you (e.g., sustainability, justice, etc.). You must always be willing to improve.
Example "success and scale bring broad responsibility" questions asked by Amazon
- Give me an example of when you made a decision that impacted the team or the company
- Can you tell me a decision that you made about your work that you regret now?
Click here to read our in-depth guide on how to answer Amazon’s behavioral interview questions.
4. Amazon SDE 2 interviewing tips
You might be a fantastic software development engineer, but that’s not always enough to ace your interviews at Amazon. Interviewing is a skill in itself, and it’s one you can improve.
Here are some key tips to help you present yourself in the best way possible.
4.1 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.
4.2 Be concise but detailed
When answering behavioral questions, start with a short description of a situation you want to cite and be prepared to go into further detail once asked.
Always use specific information and never generalize. The best way to do this is to prepare a single specific example of a past experience to illustrate your answer to a question.
When talking about your past accomplishments, Bilwasiva advises quantifying your achievements wherever possible: “Use metrics and data to demonstrate the impact of your contributions.”
4.3 Think out loud
You need to walk your interviewer through your thought process before you actually start coding or designing a system.
Amazon also recommends that you talk even while coding, as they want to know how you think. Your interviewer may give you hints about whether you’re on the right track or not.
4.4 State and check assumptions
In your system design interview, you need to explicitly state assumptions and check with your interviewer to see if those assumptions are reasonable.
4.5 Present multiple possible solutions
When you code, present multiple possible solutions if you can. Amazon wants to know your reasoning for choosing a certain solution.
4.6 Strike a balance between your ambitious and collaborative nature
The ideal Amazon candidate is ambitious and driven, but your interviewer will also want to see evidence of how well you collaborate with others.
So in your behavioral answers, be sure to get the right balance between ‘we’ and ‘I’. Acknowledge team effort by talking about what 'we' did as a team, and use 'I' to clearly demonstrate your own actions and elaborate on the impact you had.
4.7 Focus on Amazon’s Leadership Principles
Go deep on Amazon’s Leadership Principles. We can’t stress enough how heavily Amazon emphasizes culture alignment, so be sure to prepare for this as much as you prepare for your technical interviews.
While we mentioned the first four values as the ones given focus in software developer interviews, it’s best to prepare at least one story for each principle. To be more efficient, you can reframe your stories to correspond to several leadership principles.
4.8 Keep your code organized and production-ready
Keep your code organized so your interviewer won’t have a hard time understanding what you’ve written. Amazon wants to see that your code has captured the right logical structure.
While your code won’t be tested, you’ll be more impressive if you write testable code. Prepare to explain the Time/Space Complexity of your solutions, and how to better optimize for Time/Space Complexity.
Finally, don’t use random/variable function names. Write descriptive, meaningful names.
4.9 Get comfortable with coding with various mediums
Amazon advises software developer candidates to be ready to write code in real-time on an online editor. If the interview is in person, you might be asked to code on paper or a whiteboard.
If you’re not sure which medium to use, you can check with your recruiter.
5. Amazon SDE 2 preparation plan
Now that you know what questions to expect, let's focus on how to prepare.
Here are the four preparation steps we recommend to help you land your Amazon SDE 2 role:
5.1 Learn about Amazon's culture
Most candidates fail to do this. But before investing tons of time preparing for an interview at Amazon, you should take some time to make sure it's the right company for you.
Amazon is prestigious, so it's tempting to apply without considering things more carefully. It’s important to remember that the prestige of a job (by itself) won't make you happy in your day-to-day work. It's the type of work and the people you work with that will.
If you know engineers who work at Amazon or used to work there, talk to them to understand what the culture is like. The Leadership Principles we discussed above can give you a sense of what to expect, but there's no replacement for a conversation with an insider.
We would also recommend checking out the following resources:
- SDE 2 Interview Prep (by Amazon)
- Amazon's technology culture video mix (by Amazon)
- Amazon vision and mission analysis (by Panmore Institute)
- Amazon strategy teardown (by CB Insights)
- Amazon Software Development Topics (by Amazon)
- The Leadership Principles Explained by Amazon CEO Andy Jassy
- An Amazon interviewer dives deep into how she uses the Leadership Principles (by Amazon)
5.2 Practice by yourself
As mentioned above, you'll have to answer three types of questions at Amazon: coding, system design, and behavioral. The first step of your preparation should be to practice answering these types of questions by yourself.
Here are some recommended ways to approach each interview, according to Amazon:
5.2.1 Coding interview preparation
For coding interviews, we recommend trying this step-by-step approach as demonstrated in this Amazon Coding Sample video.
Here is a summary of the approach:
- Step 1: Clarify
- Ask clarification questions to remove ambiguity about the problem.
- Explore the edges of the problem.
- Step 2: Plan
- Discuss potential approaches you could take.
- Pick an approach and lay out the high-level steps.
- Step 3: Implement
- Write clean code, not pseudocode.
- Comment on your code as you go.
- Step 4: Test
- Start by testing with a simple example.
- Try breaking your code with edge and corner cases.
- Step 5: Optimize
- Calculate time complexity.
- Discuss how you can optimize your solution.
Lastly, check out our coding interview prep guide.
5.2.2 System design interview preparation
For system design interviews, we recommend trying the step-by-step approach demonstrated in Amazon’s systems design prep video.
Here is a summary of the approach:
- Step 1: Ask clarification questions.
- Understand the goal of the system (e.g., sell ebooks).
- Establish the scope of the exercise (e.g., end-to-end experience, or just API?).
- Gather scale and performance requirements (e.g., 500 transactions per second).
- Mention any assumptions you're making out loud.
- Step 2: Design at a high level, then drill down.
- Lay out the high-level components (e.g., front-end, web servers, database).
- Drill down and design each component (e.g., front-end first).
- Start with the components you're most comfortable with (e.g., front-end if you're a front-end engineer).
- Work with your interviewer to provide the right level of detail.
- Step 3: Bring it all together.
- Refer back to the requirements to make sure your approach meets them.
- Discuss any tradeoffs in the decisions you've made.
- Summarize how the system would work end-to-end.
We'd also recommend studying our system design interview guide and learning how to answer system design interview questions.
These guides cover a step-by-step method for answering system design questions, and provide several example questions with recommended solutions.
5.2.3 Behavioral interview preparation
For behavioral interviews, it's particularly important that you’re able to demonstrate some of Amazon's 16 Leadership Principles as you answer behavioral questions. We recommend referencing our guide on how to answer Amazon behavioral interview questions.
Aside from that, make sure to do your research on Amazon, their processes, and the role you’re aiming for. It takes time to familiarize yourself with all the relevant subject matters.
You can start by checking out our other Amazon guides:
Amazon process guides
Amazon interview types
- Amazon bar raiser interviews
- Amazon Leadership Principles interviews
- Amazon behavioral interviews
- Amazon systems design interviews
- 49 Amazon coding interview questions
Amazon SDE-specific interview guides
A great way to practice 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 Amazon SDE 2 interviewers
In our experience, practicing real interviews with experts who can give you company-specific feedback makes a huge difference.
Find an Amazon 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!
Click here to book software engineer mock interviews with experienced SWE interviewers.
