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The first round was an online coding assessment. There were 4 coding questions with 90 minutes to solve them. The questions were based on Data Structures and Algorithms, so I focused mainly on getting the easier problems done first and then spending the remaining time on the harder ones. The assessment was fairly time-sensitive. With four problems in 90 minutes, there wasn't much room for spending too long on a single question. I managed to perform well enough in the assessment to get shortlisted for the technical interview. After clearing the online round, I received the interview details. Technical / DSA Round The second round was a one-hour DSA interview. The interviewer started directly with coding questions. There were two problems, and the main focus was on finding the optimal solution rather than simply producing a working brute-force approach. The first problem was Find First and Last Position of Element in Sorted Array. Since the array was sorted, the interviewer expected an O(log N) solution. I first discussed the straightforward linear-search approach, but then moved towards binary search. The idea was to perform binary search separately for the first and last occurrence of the target. For the first occurrence, whenever the target was found, I continued searching towards the left. For the last occurrence, I did the opposite and continued searching towards the right. The interviewer was specifically checking whether I could use the sorted property of the array instead of scanning the complete array. The second question was Reverse Words in a String. The expected solution had to run in O(N) time and O(1) extra space. This made the problem more interesting because simply splitting the string into separate words would require additional space. I discussed the constraints and worked through the approach for reversing the words while maintaining the required complexity. The interviewer also asked about edge cases, particularly multiple spaces and spaces at the beginning or end of the string. The two questions were based on fairly common DSA concepts, but the strict complexity requirements made the round more challenging. The original candidate report specifically mentions that only the optimized complexities were accepted for both problems. Result Unfortunately, I was not selected for the next stage. I was rejected after the DSA technical round, before reaching the HR round. The main lesson I took from the interview was that solving a problem correctly is not always enough. The interviewer can specifically require a certain time or space complexity, and the solution needs to satisfy those constraints. For example, the first problem could easily be solved using a linear scan, but because the array was sorted, the expected approach was binary search. Similarly, the second problem required careful handling of the string while maintaining constant extra space. Preparation Takeaways After the interview, I realized that my preparation needed to focus more on optimal DSA solutions instead of just solving problems. For a similar LinkedIn SDE Intern interview, I would prepare: Arrays and strings Binary search Two pointers Hashing Stacks and queues Trees and graphs Recursion and backtracking Dynamic programming Time and space complexity I would also practice explaining the solution before starting to code. During the interview, the interviewer is interested in the reasoning behind the solution, not just the final code. Another public LinkedIn India SDE Intern report from a different hiring cycle describes an online HackerRank round followed by two technical interviews covering strings, stacks, arrays and binary trees, showing that the exact process can vary between LinkedIn hiring cycles. Overall, this was a useful interview experience because the questions themselves were not extremely advanced, but the interviewer expected efficient solutions and careful handling of edge cases. The biggest takeaway for me was to always think about why my solution is optimal, not just whether it works.