Microsoft Recent SDE2 Design Questions [Post Jan 2025]

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microsoft
SDE II
September 1, 202550 reads

Summary

I recently interviewed for the SDE2 role at Microsoft, where I faced a variety of design and general technical questions, including both Low-Level and High-Level Design challenges.

Full Experience

I recently had the opportunity to interview for an SDE2 position at Microsoft. During my interview process, and based on discussions with friends who also recently interviewed for the same role, we encountered a range of challenging design and conceptual questions. The interviews covered both Low-Level Design (LLD) and High-Level Design (HLD) problems, along with several generic but crucial technical questions that assessed our fundamental understanding of computer science principles.

Interview Questions (14)

Q1
Design Chess Game
System DesignHard

Design a Chess game, including its components, rules, and interactions for a Low-Level Design (LLD) perspective.

Q2
Design a Cache System
System DesignMedium

Design a cache system. Discuss and implement different eviction policies such as Least Recently Used (LRU), Least Frequently Used (LFU), and First-In, First-Out (FIFO).

Q3
Design Tetris Game
System DesignHard

Design the classic Tetris game, focusing on its core mechanics and object-oriented design.

Q4
Design Snake Game
System DesignMedium

Design the classic Snake game, considering its state management and game loop.

Q5
Design Snake Ladder Game
System DesignMedium

Design the Snake and Ladder board game, including player movements and board logic.

Q6
Design URL Shortener
System DesignHard

Design a URL shortening service similar to TinyURL, covering aspects like unique key generation, storage, and redirection.

Q7
Design draw.io
System DesignHard

Design an online diagramming tool similar to draw.io, considering real-time collaboration, object manipulation, and rendering.

Q8
Design Pastebin
System DesignHard

Design a service like Pastebin for sharing text snippets, focusing on storage, retrieval, and expiration policies.

Q9
Internal Working of Hashtable
Data Structures & AlgorithmsMedium

Explain the internal working mechanisms of a hashtable, including aspects like hash function design, collision resolution strategies (e.g., chaining, open addressing), and resizing.

Q10
Browser URL Navigation Process
OtherHard

Describe the entire process that occurs when a user types a URL into a browser and presses Enter, covering DNS resolution, TCP/IP handshake, HTTP request/response, and page rendering.

Q11
Debugging Microservice Latency
OtherMedium

Explain common strategies and tools for debugging latency issues in a distributed microservice architecture.

Q12
What is Virtual Memory?
OtherMedium

Explain the concept of virtual memory, its purpose, how it works with physical memory, and its benefits in modern operating systems.

Q13
Efficient URL Storage and Query
System DesignHard

Design a system to efficiently store and query millions of URLs to quickly check if a given URL already exists, considering solutions like Bloom filters or database indexing.

Q14
Password Storage in Database
OtherMedium

Describe best practices and techniques for securely storing passwords in a database, including hashing, salting, and not storing plain text passwords.

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