Waymo Fulltime Engineering Onsite Interview Experience and Questions
Interview Experience
At the end of August, I applied to many micro-enterprises, and then the HR contacted me saying that several hiring managers were interested. I followed up with the group that best matched my backgroun
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At the end of August, I applied to many micro-enterprises, and then the HR contacted me saying that several hiring managers were interested. I followed up with the group that best matched my background, which was related to planning and control.
Phone Interview In the first round of phone interview, the HR told me that the questions would be classic coding problems, but in reality, it was about designing and implementing some functions of a text editor, somewhat similar to Vim. At first, I felt a bit confused. Later, as requested by the interviewer, I created a basic class that implemented some insert, delete, edit, and print functions. Two days later, I received a notification to join Angsai. Angsai: 1 Question Question + 2 Coding Questions + 1 SD Question Question The interviewer was HM himself, and it consisted of basic standard questions. Coding 1: A bit like Jiu Sanjiu, but with the minimum changed to the maximum. There were two follow-ups: first, what if no other points are allowed inside (similar to San Sanjiu bullying); second, how to handle it if not limited to parallel coordinate axes. The second one didn't require implementation; just discussing the thought process was enough. Coding 2: Sparse matrices, implementing left and right multiplication of matrices and vectors. SD: A system similar to parking management + Uber. Customers call for a car at the parking lot exit and wait. Vehicles need to move between different parking spaces (e.g., charging for maintenance and then parking in a regular parking space without a charger to wait for another car). We discussed what performance metrics could be designed. This Saturday, I received a rejection letter for the system design. Sigh.
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About Waymo Interview Reports
This question was reported by a candidate who interviewed at Waymo. LeakCode aggregates interview reports from 10+ sources, including 1Point3Acres, Glassdoor, LeetCode Discuss, Blind, Reddit, Indeed, and Nowcoder. Each report is translated where necessary, deduplicated against existing entries, and tagged by company, role, round type, and reporting date.
Use this question as one calibration data point, not a memorization target. Companies typically rotate their question pools every 2-4 months; the exact wording of a 2024 question may differ from what you encounter today. The underlying pattern, difficulty level, and follow-up depth at Waymo are the higher-signal extractions to take from this report.
For broader preparation context, the Waymo interview process typically includes a recruiter screen, one or two technical phone screens, and a 4-5 round on-site loop covering coding, system design (at L4+ levels), and behavioral. Reports tagged on LeakCode show the round-by-round distribution and typical difficulty calibration. To browse questions filtered by round type and seniority, use the company hub linked above.
How To Practice This Type of Question
Solve similar problems on LeetCode under timed conditions (25-35 minutes per medium difficulty). The goal is pattern recognition: recognize the underlying technique (sliding window, two-pointer, BFS, memoized recursion, etc.) within 60-90 seconds of reading. Strong candidates verbalize their hypothesis out loud before coding, then iterate based on feedback. Weak candidates dive into implementation immediately, lose time on the wrong approach, and run out of time for follow-ups.
Companies update their question pools every 2-4 months. The exact wording of any given question may have been retired by the time you interview. Focus your prep on the pattern, not the specific problem. The patterns that appear in Waymo reports consistently are the ones worth investing in; one-off niche problems are not.
During Your Waymo Round
Apply the standard interview round template: clarify requirements (2-3 minutes), state your approach out loud and confirm direction with the interviewer (3-5 minutes), code with narration (15-25 minutes), test with concrete examples including edge cases (5 minutes), discuss optimization or trade-offs if time permits (5 minutes). This template is universally accepted across FAANG and adjacent companies; deviating from it produces weaker interviewer feedback signal.
The single most predictive failure mode in Waymo reports tagged "no hire": not asking clarifying questions. Interviewers are explicitly trained to weight this. Strong candidates ask 3-5 clarifying questions even on problems that look obvious; weak candidates dive into code immediately. The clarifying-question check is often the first signal recorded in the interviewer's written notes.