I applied through college or university. The process took 2 days. I interviewed at Microsoft (Seattle, WA) in Feb 2016
Interview
Lots of candidates, lots of rounds. The managers did a good job of shepherding around the candidates but it was easy to feel lost in a room of 100 people. In addition, it was frustrating that not a lot of the people who you talk to say anything more about their job than "I work on the Bing team" and general stuff like that.
I applied online. I interviewed at Microsoft (Melbourne)
Interview
After submitting an online application, I received a HackerRank assessment after passing the resume screening stage, then I was rejected after completing the assessment and did not proceed to further interview rounds.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
The assessment consisted of two LeetCode-medium-level coding questions to be completed within 75 minutes.
45 mins technical interview with a member of their San fran team. Very relaxed and informal but questions were focused and lots of follow ups. Easy to schedule as was over video conferencing platform
Straightforward technical loop overall, with strong interviewers at every stage. I genuinely enjoyed the in-depth conversations around technical challenges and algorithmic problem-solving — the entire process felt well-structured and genuinely engaging.