Google

I participated in the Google Big Code challenge and eventually reached the interview stage for the Software Engineering Intern role. The process was quite different from a normal internship application because the initial opportunity came through the Big Code program. After progressing through the competition stages, I was contacted by a recruiter and was invited to continue with the internship hiring process. The first interaction was a short recruiter call of around 15 minutes. It was mainly an introductory conversation. We discussed my background, interests, competitive programming experience, and some general details about my profile. There wasn't much technical discussion during this call. After this, I was informed about the upcoming technical interviews and the preparation expected for them. The first technical round was focused almost entirely on Data Structures and Algorithms. The interviewer started with a brief introduction and then moved into the coding discussion. The questions were not simply about writing code; I was expected to explain my thought process, discuss complexity, and consider different edge cases. I was able to work through the problems by first explaining the straightforward approach and then improving it where necessary. The interviewer also asked follow-up questions to check whether I understood why the solution worked rather than just whether I could implement it. Overall, the first round was challenging but manageable, and it gave me a good idea of the level of problem solving expected in Google's internship interviews. After clearing the first technical round, I received the opportunity to appear for the second round. This round was considerably tougher for me. The second technical interview again focused on DSA, but the main challenge was a tree-based problem. I understood the general direction of the problem, but I struggled to reach the complete solution and implementation within the interview. The interviewer asked several follow-ups and gave some hints, but I was not able to handle the problem as well as I wanted. The difficulty of this round made it clear that knowing standard data structures is not enough at this level. The interviewer was looking for the ability to quickly identify the underlying pattern, build an efficient approach, and implement it correctly while handling corner cases. After the second round, I was not selected for the internship. Although the result was disappointing, the process was a valuable experience for me. Getting an interview opportunity through Google Big Code itself was a good learning experience, and the technical rounds showed me the level at which I needed to improve my DSA skills. In particular, the second round made me realize that I needed more practice with difficult tree and graph problems and with developing solutions under interview pressure. One thing I particularly liked about the process was that the interviews focused heavily on problem solving rather than simply testing theoretical knowledge. Recent 2026 Big Code candidates have similarly reported DSA-focused technical interviews, while other participants who reached the internship pipeline have described recruiter interaction followed by multiple coding rounds. Overall, I wasn't able to convert the opportunity into an internship, but the experience gave me a much clearer understanding of what to expect from a Google-level technical interview. It also helped me identify the areas I needed to work on, especially harder tree problems, optimization, and communicating my approach more clearly while solving under time constraints.