Senior Software Engineer applicants have rated the interview process at Amazon with 3 out of 5 (where 5 is the highest level of difficulty) and assessed their interview experience as 50% positive. To compare, the company-average is 59.5% positive. This is according to Glassdoor user ratings.
Common stages of the interview process at Amazon as a Senior Software Engineer according to 2 Glassdoor interviews include:
One on one interview: 25%
Phone interview: 25%
Group panel interview: 25%
Skills test: 25%
Here are the most commonly searched roles for interview reports -
1. phone screening, casual
2. phone screening, somewhat technical and short
3. code screening via online editor and phone
4. all day on site interview
Their interviewing process is rigorous. They do a lot of screening before you spend any time face to face. I think this is a good method, as it weeds a lot of people out before-hand. Stressful though!
I applied through a recruiter. The process took 5 weeks. I interviewed at Amazon (Seattle, WA) in Oct 2014
Interview
The biggest difficulty with this interview was the jet lag. I had planned to dose myself with caffeen to keep myself alert, but the canteen was consistently out of everything except decaf.
One interviewing consider his job to see how upset he could make me, and see how I would interact. He started off by asking me about things not on my resume, not part of the job, and acted as if I didn't have those experiences I was a bad candidate. Then he lead me to a question about a time I had to fix a serious customer issue. The more negitive I described the problem it the more positive he reacted, as if he was pleased. I fell for this hook line and sinker and actually called a product I had worked on @RAP twice. Granted I was refering to the way the customer reported the problem, but I'm sure that cost me the interview right there. I can't blaim them as you don't want someone who will call a product they worked on @RAP even if is under extreme stress and jet lag. But it leaves this as a bad interview experience.
With most of the interview questions, I felt I did reasonably well. There was two white boarding questions. One of which was trivial, the other was challenging.
The recruiter would provide no feedback.
I interviewed at Amazon (New York, NY) in May 2013
Interview
Amazon HR called me describing the opportunity and asking whether I am interested. They were in New York for interview and after brief updates on my resume, I was selected for the final round interview.