SpaceX Software Engineer Interview Questions
& Process
Real candidates share what happened, how many rounds they had,
and how the experience turned out.
Based on 249 interview experiences · FREE TO READ
Candidate interview experiences
First-hand accounts from people who interviewed at SpaceX.
SpaceX
Software Engineer
Intern Average Positive experience No offer 4 rounds
Interview process
Recruiter call Phone screen Take home Technical screen
Interview formats
Behavioral Technical Coding
A recruiter reached out to me to set up a phone interview with a lead engineer. They asked me about projects I'd worked on that were on my resume, then asked questions about data structures and algorithms and when they might be useful. After that, I was sent a technical assessment to complete within 12 hours, though it didn't take that long. I didn't hear back for about 4 weeks after submitting it and unfortunately didn't get the offer, but I did get some good feedback.
Confirmed questions1 question
- Can you explain what a hash table is, its benefits, how hashing functions, and strategies for handling collisions?
SpaceX
Software Engineer
Mid Average Positive experience No offer 3 rounds
Interview process
Recruiter call Take home Phone screen
Interview formats
Coding Technical
The interview process for this software engineer role felt like it took forever, standard stuff I guess. It started with a recruiter chat where they hit me with some basic coding questions and asked about my past experiences. After that, I had to complete a coding test that I could do at home. Then, I had a phone interview with a senior engineer, though honestly, I wasn't sure they'd even show up since they were more than 10 minutes late.
Confirmed questions1 question
- Could you tell me if Python is a compiled or an interpretive language?
SpaceX
Software Engineer
Entry Difficult Negative experience No offer 5 rounds
Interview process
Recruiter call Take home Phone screen Onsite
Interview formats
Other Presentation Technical
Applied online and a recruiter set up a call shortly after. Completed a take-home assignment that took 4 hours, it wasn't leetcode style. Then, I had a 45-minute chat with the hiring manager. The final stage was an on-site, which included a presentation and 5 other interviews. I felt I did well, but was ghosted and the recruiter didn't even reject me after I followed up.
Confirmed questions1 question
- Can you explain what an iPad is?
SpaceX Software Engineer Interview Questions
Quoted word for word from SpaceX interview reports.
“Find a pair of duplicate numbers in an array of length n with positive integers from 1 to n-1.”
Read reports →“Given two arrays of strings, can you determine if all strings in the first are in the second, returning a boolean? And how would you optimize this if each array contained a million elements?”
Read reports →“Could you calculate the total cost of a rocket part based on its definition, which includes a list of sub-parts and the production/assembly cost from these sub-parts?”
Read reports →“Regarding a system with a voltage source, capacitor, and resistor, could you describe its step response when the voltage source experiences a significant increase?”
Read reports →“Could you write an algorithm that determines how to cover a group of ground stations using a set of satellites, considering their coordinates and visibility/interference constraints? This problem is at least NP-Complete.”
Read report →“Could you describe the different types of heat transfer a rocket might undergo while on the ground, during its ascent, and once it's in orbit?”
Read report →“Design a system for Starlink purchasing and fulfillment that can manage extreme demand surges, such as those caused by Elon's tweets.”
Read report →“Implement a 3D Trigonometry Vector problem that was actually a red herring for a max users/priority queue question.”
Read report →“Can you discuss the different types of memory and their advantages/disadvantages (L1/L2 cache, RAM, Solid State)?”
Read report →Formats, difficulty and experience
Across all 249 SpaceX interview reports.