I recently had an interview experience with Canva that I felt was both frustrating and disappointing. The interview process consisted of three rounds.

The first was an HR round, where they asked basic questions about hashcode and equals, inheritance vs. composition, synchronization and locking, and checked vs. unchecked exceptions. Fairly standard stuff for any Java developer.

The second round was a live coding session where I had to implement a topological sort algorithm. I completed the task without any issues and felt confident about my performance.

The final round, however, was the most grueling and exhaustive. I had to design an e-commerce website, which took around 45 minutes.

After that, I was asked to answer some behavioral questions for 45 minutes, followed by a coding task, which was also a 45-minute round. In that round, I was asked to write the HashMap functions from scratch without using any utility functions.

Despite the challenges, I nailed every part of the interview and completed all the tasks successfully. However, in the end, they rejected my profile.

The reason? Apparently, I missed a few points in the system design interview. Honestly, this felt incredibly unfair. I gave it my best, completed each task thoroughly, and was confident about my abilities. The rejection came as a shock, especially after everything seemed to go well during the interview.

It’s a shame that despite performing well across multiple rounds, a few missed points were enough for them to dismiss my profile. If you’re considering interviewing with this company, just be prepared for an unpredictable and stressful experience.

HR Screening * 30 mins:

• Hashcode and equals
• Inheritance vs. composition
• Synchronization and locking
• Checked vs. unchecked exceptions

Java Live Coding DS & Algo * 1 hr:

• Topological Sort

Final Round:

System Design * 45 mins:

• Design an e-commerce website

Behavioural * 45 mins:

• Tell me about a time where you’ve disagreed with your Product Manager or Designer. How did you resolve this?
• Tell me about a time where you did something for your team that took it from good to great.
• Tell me about a time where your team did not achieve the goals they set out to do? What did you do about this situation?

Coding * 45 mins:

• Write the HashMap functions from scratch without using any utils functions