Amazon SDE-1 Interview Experience
Summary
I cleared all interview rounds for an SDE‑1 position after preparing with online resources and the STAR method for behavioural questions, and received an offer on April 1st.
Full Experience
Round 1: (Technical round, Feb 4th)
Q1) It is similar to Cheapest Flights Within K Stops
Q2) You are given a list of power sources, where each source has a certain amount of power, and n machines.
Each machine must be assigned power from only one source (no combining from multiple sources). A single power source can distribute its power to multiple machines, as long as the total allocated power does not exceed its capacity.
What is the maximum possible value of the minimum power assigned to any machine?
Example : sources = [5, 8, 6], n = 4. Return value = 4
Round 2: (Technical + Behavioural, Feb 16th)
Q1) You are given an array sticks where each element represents the length of a stick (positive integer).
You can connect any two sticks together to form a single stick. When you connect two sticks with lengths x and y, the resulting stick has length x + y, and you must pay a cost equal to x + y.
Your goal is to connect all the sticks together until only one stick remains. You need to find the minimum total cost to achieve this.
Q2) Given an array containing both positive and negative integers, the task is to find the length of the longest subarray with a sum equals to 0.
Behavioural:
Tell me about a time you when you did something outside of your scope of work or responsibilities. What was it? What was the outcome?
Round 3: (Gen AI + Technical, Mar 3rd)
Gen AI Discussion:
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How do you use Gen AI tools in your projects/personal work? (I discussed that I use mostly for Boiler plate code, CRUD APIs development)
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Following up she asked whether I used them anywhere for complex tasks?
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Where do you think we should use them and where not? why?
Technical:
Chef Finds KthLargest Element
Chef is responsible for maintaining a dynamic list of values (such as test scores, rankings, or performance metrics). As new values continue to stream in, Chef needs to efficiently determine the current k‑th largest value at any given moment. This allows Chef to constantly track thresholds—such as admission cut‑offs, ranking limits, or qualification marks—in real time.
In interview the question is framed such a way that k is fixed but interviewer told me to consider k as dynamic i.e. k will change.
Example:
Initial List = [3, 7, 1]
Stream/Queries/Operations = [{find, k=3}, {insert, 4}, {insert, 9}, {find, k=2}, {find, k=4}]
Return values = [1, 7, 3]
Interviewer gave a hint that we need to use a data structure.
I explained a solution using BST with few modifications. Interviewer is satisfied with the logic but that is not the optimal solution. She asked me to think for any other data structure but time is up.
I think we can use segment tree to solve this but any other way/data structure?
Round 4: (Behavioural, Mar 18th)
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Tell me a time where you needed to deep dive to find a problem/issue? How did you found that? What actions did you took?
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Tell me a time when you didn’t know what to do next or how to solve a challenging problem. how did you learn what you dont know? What were the options you considered? What was the outcome?
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Give me an example of a tough or critical piece of feedback you received? How did you deal with it?
Received Offer letter on April 1st
All my rounds are conducted virtual.
I referred to similar interview experiences posted on Leetcode, Reddit, Linkedin. For behavioural rounds i followed few YouTube channels and STAR method while answering.
Interview Questions (4)
Maximum Minimum Power Allocation
You are given a list of power sources, where each source has a certain amount of power, and n machines. Each machine must be assigned power from only one source (no combining from multiple sources). A single power source can distribute its power to multiple machines, as long as the total allocated power does not exceed its capacity.
Goal: Maximize the minimum power assigned to any machine.
Example:
sources = [5, 8, 6]
n = 4
Output = 4
Minimum Cost to Connect Sticks
Given an array sticks where each element represents the length of a stick (positive integer). You can connect any two sticks together; the cost of connecting sticks of lengths x and y is x + y, and the resulting stick has length x + y. Connect all sticks until only one remains while minimizing the total cost.
Goal: Return the minimum total cost to connect all sticks.
Longest Subarray with Sum Zero
Given an array containing both positive and negative integers, find the length of the longest contiguous subarray whose elements sum to 0.
Dynamic Kth Largest Element
Maintain a dynamic list of values that supports two operations:
- Insert a new value into the list.
- Find the k‑th largest element, where k can change between queries.
Example:
Initial List = [3, 7, 1]
Operations = [{find, k=3}, {insert, 4}, {insert, 9}, {find, k=2}, {find, k=4}]
Output = [1, 7, 3]
The interviewer hinted that a data structure is required. The candidate discussed using a modified BST and considered a segment tree as an alternative.
Preparation Tips
I referred to similar interview experiences posted on LeetCode, Reddit, and LinkedIn. For behavioural rounds I watched a few YouTube channels and practiced the STAR method for answering situational questions.