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Uber· SDE-2

Uber SDE-2 Interview | Reject

Location
Bengaluru, India
Experience
2.6 years
Posted
7 Apr 2025
417 reads

Summary

I interviewed for an SDE-2 role at Uber in Bengaluru, India, and was ultimately rejected despite positive outcomes in most rounds, including DSA screening and onsite. My final verdict was rejected after failing the Machine Coding and Bar Raiser rounds.

How it went

I just finished my Uber SDE-2 (Bengaluru, India) loop. Here's how it went.

Current Company : Ecom company Current Exp: 2.6 YoE Current Designation: SDE-2

1. Online Assessment (19th Jan)

It consists of four problems. I don't remember the problems now, but problems 1 and 2 were easy, 3 was implementation-heavy, and 4 was medium. Got 523/600 as I was able to solve the last problem partially.

2. DSA Screening Round (22 March)

Interviewer Designation: SSE

Duration: 1 hr

Problem:

  1. Given a 2D plan & you have incoming requests for isLand(I,j) & setLand(I,j): Told the basic Set approach.
  2. Now there’s another request for numberOfIslands(): Told I’ll do BFS or DFS whenever I get the numberOfIslands requests. 
  3. Now, the frequency of the numberOfIslands requests increased: Told that I’ll utilise DSU, find & merge, whenever we are processing setLand(I,j) , I’ll be try to merge this with neighboring elements, this way our setLand will take extra time than before but our numberOfIslands will be in O(1)

The interviewer asked me to write the code for 3rd follow-up. Was able to write the working code within the given time frame.

Verdict: Positive 

3. DSA Onsite Round (22 March)

Interviewer Designation: SDE-2

Duration: 1 hr

Problem: https://leetcode.com/problems/making-a-large-island/description/ 

Was able to solve this problem completely within the time frame.

Verdict: Positive 

4. Hiring Manager Round (22 March)

Interviewer Designation: Senior EM

Duration: 1 hr

  1. Asked me about the work I’m doing in my current company. 
  2. Deep dived into the work I mentioned in my resume with some HLD diagrams on excalidraw. 
  3. Behavioural questions like: Why do you want to leave your current company?
  4. Tell me about your interaction with your juniors within the team.

Verdict: Positive 

5. Machine Coding Round (22 March)

Interviewer Designation: SSE

Duration: 1 hr

Problem: Implement the File system API. The function will mimic their respective Linux commands 

  1. Implement mkdir
  2. Implement cd (The path may contain regex)
  3. Implement pwd

Verdict: Negative

6. Bar Raiser Round (1 April)

Interviewer Designation: Staff Engineer

Problem: Design a type ahead suggestion like in Google Search. 

Started with NFR & FR, then Back of the Envelope, then told the basic approach which wasn’t scalable using Relational DB. Later told that I’ll be using Trie to maintain the prefix and at each node will cache the top 10 words. But I feel like my HLD diagram could have been better, although I told him things verbally above

Verdict: Negative

Final Verdict: Rejected PS: I participated in 22 March Hiring Drive.

Questions asked (12)

  1. 01

    2D Plan Land Operations (Basic Set)

    Data Structures & Algorithms

    Given a 2D plan and incoming requests for isLand(I,j) and setLand(I,j).

  2. 02

    2D Plan Land Operations with numberOfIslands (BFS/DFS)

    Data Structures & Algorithms

    Follow-up to 2D plan land operations: There’s another request for numberOfIslands().

  3. 03

    Optimized Number of Islands with DSU

    Data Structures & Algorithms

    Follow-up to 2D plan land operations: The frequency of numberOfIslands requests increased. Optimize the solution.

  4. 04

    Making A Large Island

    Data Structures & Algorithms

    Open the problem
  5. 05

    Current Work Discussion

    Behavioral

    Asked me about the work I’m doing in my current company.

  6. 06

    Resume Deep Dive with HLD Diagrams

    System Design

    Deep dived into the work I mentioned in my resume with some HLD (High-Level Design) diagrams on Excalidraw.

  7. 07

    Why leave current company?

    Behavioral

    Behavioural question: Why do you want to leave your current company?

  8. 08

    Interaction with junior team members

    Behavioral

    Behavioural question: Tell me about your interaction with your juniors within the team.

  9. 09

    Implement mkdir

    Data Structures & Algorithms

    Implement the mkdir function as part of a File System API that mimics Linux commands.

  10. 10

    Implement cd with Regex Support

    Data Structures & Algorithms

    Implement the cd function as part of a File System API, where the path may contain regex.

  11. 11

    Implement pwd

    Data Structures & Algorithms

    Implement the pwd function as part of a File System API that mimics Linux commands.

  12. 12

    Design Type Ahead Suggestion

    System Design

    Design a type-ahead suggestion system like in Google Search.

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