Stripe Interview Questions for Software Engineers

In tech interviews at Stripe, the focus will be on assessing your practical knowledge rather than your theoretical concepts. This unique aspect of their interview process sets them apart. So as you get started, remember this and prep for Stripe interview questions accordingly. 

To start your prep, update your resume and LinkedIn, choose a programming language you'll be using to answer the questions, and get started. And when answering Stripe's interview questions, ensure that you clearly demonstrate your practical skills. 

If you are preparing for a tech interview, check out our technical interview checklist, interview questions page, and salary negotiation e-book to get interview-ready! Also, read Here's What's Missing From Your Software Engineer Resume and How to Communicate Effectively as a Software Engineer for insights and guidance on tech interviews.

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To give you a better idea of what you can expect in a software engineer interview at Stripe, in this article, we'll be covering:

• Stripe Software Engineer Interview Process
• Stripe Coding Interview Questions
• Stripe System Design Interview Questions
• Stripe Behavioral Interview Questions
• FAQs on Stripe Interview Questions

Stripe Software Engineer Interview Process

The Stripe interview process for software engineers consists of three rounds. The first round is an initial phone screening round, which is an informal discussion. It is followed by a technical phone interview. If you clear both, you'll have to clear the final round — on-site interviews.

The on-site round will consist of five interview rounds:

1. Coding interview
2. Behavioral round with the hiring manager
3. Bug hunt
4. System design 
5. Problem-solving/integration task

While there is only one software engineer role at Stripe, you can apply through four different interview loops — frontend, full-stack, backend, and infrastructure. The interview process is pretty much the same for each of these at Stripe. However, the interview questions asked are different.

Next up, we'll take you through some questions you can expect.

Stripe Coding Interview Questions

In the coding round, as well as the technical phone screen, you can expect questions that'll test your coding skills and your knowledge of data structures. Some Stripe interview questions you can expect in these rounds:

1. Given: An array of integers and a value.
   Find: Whether there are any two integers in the array whose sum is equal to the given value.
2. Given: A two-dimensional array.
   Task: If any element zero, make the whole row and column zero.
3. Given: The head pointers of two linked lists. Each linked list represents an integer number, where each node is a digit.
   Task: Add them and return the resulting linked list.
4. Given: A linked list. Each node has two pointers — the regular 'next' pointer and an 'arbitrary_pointer' that can point to any node in the linked list.
   Task: Write a code to make a deep copy of the given linked list (any operations on the original list — inserting, modifying, and removing — should not affect the copied list).
5. Given: The root of a binary tree.
   Task: Display the node values at each level.
6. Given: A binary tree
   Task: Connect sibling pointer to the next node in the same level, with the last node in each level pointing to the first node of the next level.
7. Given: A sentence (an array of characters).
   Task: Reverse the order of the words.
8. Given: String, ‘S.’
   Find: All substrings in S that are palindromes (non-single-letter).
9. Given: A list of daily stock prices (integers).
   Task: Return the buy and sell prices for making the maximum profit. Maximize the single buy/sell profit and try to minimize the loss in case you can't make any profit.
10. Given: An unsorted array of positive numbers from 1 to n, containing all numbers from 1 to n, except one.
    Find: The missing number
11. Given: N people on an MxM grid.
    Find: A meeting point that will require the people to travel the least total distance.
12. Given: A positive integer.
    Task: Target and print all possible combinations of positive integers that sum up to the target number.

For more coding interview questions and solutions to crack Stripe and other tech interviews, visit the Problems page.

Stripe System Design Interview Questions

System design interview questions at Stripe test your ability to work with complex systems. These questions don't really have a "right answer." In this round, the interviews mainly focus on your approach to arriving at solutions to problems.

Here are a few sample Stripe system design interview questions:

1. Design an architecture to deliver webhooks to customers.
2. Design a notification system that can handle an enormous amount of traffic. 
3. How will you sketch out the high-level design of a large system for a large company?
   

For tips on cracking system design interview questions at Stripe and other top tech companies, read this article. 

Behavioral Stripe Interview Questions

When prepping for the initial phone screen round, as well as the behavioral interview round on-site, prepare questions along the lines of:

1. We at Stripe are very proud that we stay one step ahead of our competitors. How will you contribute to this?
2. What is your technical specialty?
3. Walk us through your biggest work-related accomplishment.
4. Describe the ideal customer for Stripe.
5. Tell us about a new skill you acquired recently. How did you go about it?
6. According to you, what has been the biggest advancement in payment technology this past year?
7. Differentiate between customer service and customer support.
8.  We always aim to hire leaders at Stripe. Elaborate upon a time when you were in a leadership role.
9. What is your understanding of this position and the responsibilities that come with it?

The best way to answer behavioral questions is using the STAR method. Here are 9 more behavioral questions for practice.

Be sure to include all the interview questions listed here and practice other similar questions to prepare yourself for the Stripe interview thoroughly. A consistent, well-planned interview prep will surely help you land that job!

FAQs on Stripe Interview Questions

Some commonly asked questions on Stripe interview questions are:

Q1. Are Stripe interview questions hard?

The Stripe interview process for software engineers is famous for being more practical than academic, as is the case with most major tech companies. So if you know your basics well, you shouldn't have any problems.

Q2. Is Stripe a good place to work?

At Stripe, you can expect lots of opportunities to learn about the fintech space. Further, the work that they do is very high impact, and you'll be working with some of the brightest minds in the industry.

Q3. What does Stripe do?

Stripe is a tech company that builds economic infrastructure for the internet. Businesses of every size, from startups to major companies, use Stripe's software to facilitate payments and manage their businesses online.

Q4. What sorts of interview questions can you expect at Stripe?

Behavioral questions are pretty straightforward (if you have a good idea about the company and its core values). The technical questions will most likely be based on system design, databases, heaps, and data structures. 

Q5. How long does it take to hear back from Stripe after an interview?

After the on-site interviews, you can expect to hear back from the recruiters within a few days. 

Want to Crack the Stripe Software Engineer Interview?

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