Amazon Backend Engineer interview questions and process

Updated 24 Sep 2026 · 13 sources

Hiring Pulse: where Amazon candidates are right now

Dated status reports from public Reddit threads and anonymous PortLume reports, updated Oct 18. Not official Amazon data.

91 status reports in the last 7 days
6 days: median from final interview to a decision (13 people)
Latest movement: 7 offers, 6 rejections, 13 final rounds reported since Oct 11

Latest Amazon hiring reports

Oct 17: Joining date Oct 17 (r/amazonsdeprep)
Oct 17: Final round Sep 30 (r/leetcode)
Oct 17: Interview Oct 15 (r/amazonsdeprep)
Oct 17: OA done Oct 17 (r/leetcode)
Oct 17: OA done Sep 25 then Interview Oct 17 (r/FAANGrecruiting)

Candidates rate the Amazon Backend Engineer interview Medium-Hard: Amazon's backend loop combines DSA coding, low-level design, HLD, and heavy Leadership Principles probing across multiple 60-min rounds, per the SDE2 and backend write-ups. Reports describe 6 rounds, from Online Assessment (DSA + behavioral/workstyle) to Managerial/Bar Raiser (LP + projects), with about 2-6 weeks from first call to offer.

Difficulty: Medium-Hard
Skills asked about: Data Structures and Algorithms, Low-level and system design, Leadership Principles / behavioral storytelling

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Amazon Backend Engineer interview rounds

Online Assessment (DSA + behavioral/workstyle): OA has 2 coding problems with slight variations plus behavioral/workstyle questions, per the SDE2 Seattle report.
Phone/Technical Screen (coding + LP)
Onsite Coding Round
Onsite Low-Level/System Design Round
Onsite HLD Round
Managerial/Bar Raiser (LP + projects)

Questions reported in Amazon Backend Engineer interviews

Design a directory system just like the Unix directory system.
Given a sorted array of N integers, generate the power set for this array.
Implement serialization and deserialization of a binary tree of integers.
Generate a number based on the majority set bits in a given array of integers.
Given an API returning a list of images with tags, design filtering so selecting multiple tag checkboxes filters the images.
Questions on DSA, UNIX commands, and web security in the technical round.

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Amazon Backend Engineer interview: quick answers

How many rounds are in the Amazon Backend Engineer interview?

Public reports describe 6 rounds for the Amazon Backend Engineer interview: (1) Online Assessment, (2) Phone/Technical Screen, (3) Onsite Coding Round, (4) Onsite Low-Level/System Design Round, (5) Onsite HLD Round, (6) Managerial/Bar Raiser. Round 1: OA has 2 coding problems with slight variations plus behavioral/workstyle questions, per the SDE2 Seattle report.

Is the Amazon interview difficult?

Public reports put the Amazon Backend Engineer interview at Medium-Hard difficulty. Amazon's backend loop combines DSA coding, low-level design, HLD, and heavy Leadership Principles probing across multiple 60-min rounds, per the SDE2 and backend write-ups. The process has 6 rounds, from Online Assessment to Managerial/Bar Raiser.

Does Amazon ask DSA in Backend Engineer interviews?

Yes. Rounds that involve coding: Online Assessment (DSA + behavioral/workstyle), Phone/Technical Screen (coding + LP), Onsite Coding Round. Reported coding questions include "Given a sorted array of N integers, generate the power set for this array" and "Implement serialization and deserialization of a binary tree of integers".

How long does Amazon take to give results?

Time to a result for the Amazon Backend Engineer process, per public reports: 2-6 weeks. The process has 6 rounds, from Online Assessment to Managerial/Bar Raiser. Based on 13 public reports, last updated Sep 2026.

Sources

Based on 13 public reports: LeetCode Discuss (7), Glassdoor (3), YouTube (2), AmbitionBox (1), last updated Sep 2026.

Compiled by Adarsh Sharma from public candidate reports. Unofficial guide: PortLume AI is not affiliated with Amazon.

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