INTERVIEW PREP · INDIA
PhonePe software engineer interview
The rounds at each level, what interviewers score, and the questions candidates report, linked to problems you can solve here with the editor, walkthrough video and solutions in four languages.
Levels
| AlgoRung level | PhonePe title | Experience | Interviews after screening | Design rounds |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SDE 1 | Software Engineer 1 | New grad to about 2 years | about 3 | Yes |
| SDE 2 | Software Engineer 2 | About 2 to 5 years | about 4 | Yes |
| SDE 3 | Senior Software Engineer | Senior, about 5 to 10 years | about 4 | Yes |
| SDE 4 | Not public | Staff, principal and above | – | – |
The rounds, in order
Pick your level above to see only your rounds. Each step links to a guide on how that round is scored.
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Online assessment · 90 min
Campus hiring uses a coding test; lateral loops usually start straight with machine coding.
SDE 1
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Low-level design / machine coding · 90 min
Machine coding: about 90 minutes to build a working in-memory app, then a 30-minute debrief full of 'why' questions.
SDE 1, SDE 2, SDE 3
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Coding (DSA) · 60 min
PSDS: two problems candidates often rate hard; a well-explained approach can earn partial credit.
SDE 1, SDE 2, SDE 3
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System design (HLD) · 60 min
Database choice, auth at the gateway, token propagation between services, and scaling.
SDE 2, SDE 3
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Hiring manager · 55 min
Your current project's architecture in depth (sharding, replication, APIs), sometimes with a design problem.
SDE 1, SDE 2, SDE 3
ScreeningCodingDesignBehavioralDecision
What interviewers look for
- A working, modular machine-coding submission with validations and error handling
- Thread safety in the machine-coding code
- Justifying data structures and design patterns
- Optimal DSA under pressure
- Depth on your own system's architecture
Topics to focus on
Weighted by what candidates say comes up and by the reported questions below.
Coding questions candidates report
Each links to the AlgoRung problem: write-up, animated walkthrough, solutions in Java, Python, C++ and JavaScript, and an editor with hidden tests. Shared questions show the other companies that ask them.
- Distribute Coins in Binary Tree Medium Trees & BST also Amazon
- Word Search Medium Recursion & Backtracking also Microsoft
- LRU Cache Medium Design Data Structures also Amazon, Microsoft, Apple +4
- Subarray Sum Equals K Medium Arrays & Hashing also Meta
No questions match.
PhonePe coding questions by topic · PhonePe SDE 1 interview · PhonePe SDE 2 interview · PhonePe senior interview
Also reported, not on AlgoRung yet (1)
Word Search II
Design questions
Every level faces machine coding, and it is the main filter: code that works but is poorly structured or not thread-safe gets rejected. SDE-2 and above add an HLD round.
- Reported: Product catalog search with sponsored ranking (machine coding) E-commerce (Amazon) · walkthrough
- Reported: Web search engine Google Search · walkthrough
- Reported: Real-time cluster monitoring Monitoring and alerting · walkthrough
Also reported: Customer issue resolution system (machine coding) · In-memory to-do list with analytics (machine coding) · Multi-tenant Q&A platform
PhonePe system design questions in detail · How to answer any design question: the LADDER method
Worth knowing
- The customer issue resolution machine-coding problem appears in both 2024 and 2025 reports.
- An August 2025 SDE-2 loop: machine coding (90 + 30), PSDS (60), design (60) and manager (55).
- Machine coding is graded on structure, validation, error handling and concurrency, not just whether it works.
Interviewing at PhonePe?
Add the date and your level. AlgoRung builds a plan back from the interview day, schedules revisions before it, and counts problems you have already solved for every company that asks them.
Sources
Written in our own words from these public pages and candidate reports, checked November 2026. Company names are trademarks of their owners.