Instacart

Senior Software Engineer Interview Experience - Boston, Massachusetts

March 1, 2021

Positive ExperienceNo Offer

Process

10 min BQ + 3 consecutive coding questions in a row. Time is very limited.

Not enough time to ask questions at the end. I passed all test cases but was rejected. Perhaps using TreeMap is not the recommended approach.

Questions

What was the most challenging project I got?
Key-value store with a timestamp.
Final follow-up by returning the nearest pair just under the timestamp.

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Interview Statistics

The following metrics were computed from 1 interview experience for the Instacart Senior Software Engineer role in Boston, Massachusetts.

Success Rate

0%

Pass Rate

Instacart's interview process for their Senior Software Engineer roles in Boston, Massachusetts is extremely selective, failing the vast majority of engineers.

Experience Rating

Positive100%

Neutral0%

Negative0%

Candidates reported having very good feelings for Instacart's Senior Software Engineer interview process in Boston, Massachusetts.

Instacart Work Experiences

Fun Challenges, Lacking Culture

Senior Software Engineer • Current Employee

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Pros: I love working here. There are lots of opportunities and fun challenges.

Cons: Lack of in-office culture since most employees work remotely.

Fun Challenges, Lacking Culture

Senior Software Engineer • Current Employee

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Pros: I love working here. There are lots of opportunities and fun challenges.

Cons: Lack of in-office culture since most employees work remotely.

Good Team, Limited Growth

Senior Software Engineer • Current Employee

Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

Pros: Flexibility of work processes and a good team culture.

Cons: Nothing much to mention. Some instability and low career growth opportunities.

Good Team, Limited Growth

Senior Software Engineer • Current Employee

Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

Pros: Flexibility of work processes and a good team culture.

Cons: Nothing much to mention. Some instability and low career growth opportunities.

Busy, fast-paced work

Senior Software Engineer • Current Employee

Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

August 15, 2025

Pros: - Good adaptation of AI in processes. - Good mobility between teams. - Opportunity to work on large-scale Rails monoliths. - Good company summits.

Cons: - Technical debt and hard deadlines mean you'll be working outside of work hours more often than not. - Internal politics can be toxic, leading to transactional work relationships. - Code is sometimes hard to merge because it requires approval by specific owners who are not always available.

Busy, fast-paced work

Senior Software Engineer • Current Employee

Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

August 15, 2025

Pros: - Good adaptation of AI in processes. - Good mobility between teams. - Opportunity to work on large-scale Rails monoliths. - Good company summits.

Cons: - Technical debt and hard deadlines mean you'll be working outside of work hours more often than not. - Internal politics can be toxic, leading to transactional work relationships. - Code is sometimes hard to merge because it requires approval by specific owners who are not always available.

Fun Challenges, Lacking Culture

Senior Software Engineer • Current Employee

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Pros: I love working here. There are lots of opportunities and fun challenges.

Cons: Lack of in-office culture since most employees work remotely.

5.0
Fun Challenges, Lacking Culture
Senior Software Engineer • Current Employee
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
July 29, 2024
Pros: I love working here. There are lots of opportunities and fun challenges.
Cons: Lack of in-office culture since most employees work remotely.

Good Team, Limited Growth

Senior Software Engineer • Current Employee

Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

Pros: Flexibility of work processes and a good team culture.

Cons: Nothing much to mention. Some instability and low career growth opportunities.

3.0
Good Team, Limited Growth
Senior Software Engineer • Current Employee
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
July 16, 2025
Pros: Flexibility of work processes and a good team culture.
Cons: Nothing much to mention. Some instability and low career growth opportunities.

Busy, fast-paced work

Senior Software Engineer • Current Employee

Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

August 15, 2025

Pros: - Good adaptation of AI in processes. - Good mobility between teams. - Opportunity to work on large-scale Rails monoliths. - Good company summits.

Cons: - Technical debt and hard deadlines mean you'll be working outside of work hours more often than not. - Internal politics can be toxic, leading to transactional work relationships. - Code is sometimes hard to merge because it requires approval by specific owners who are not always available.

3.0
Busy, fast-paced work
Senior Software Engineer • Current Employee
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
August 15, 2025
Pros: - Good adaptation of AI in processes. - Good mobility between teams. - Opportunity to work on large-scale Rails monoliths. - Good company summits.
Cons: - Technical debt and hard deadlines mean you'll be working outside of work hours more often than not. - Internal politics can be toxic, leading to transactional work relationships. - Code is sometimes hard to merge because it requires approval by specific owners who are not always available.

Instacart Interview Questions

Average Waiting Time

You're given a list of customer arrival and service times. Calculate the average waiting time for all customers, assuming they are served in the order they arrive.

Find First and Last Position of Element in Sorted Array

Given a sorted array, find the first and last position of a given target value. If the target is not found, return [-1, -1].

ArraysBinary Search

Check if Every Row and Column Contains All Numbers

Determine if every row and every column in a given square matrix contains all the numbers from 1 to n, where n is the size of the matrix. Effectively, check if it's a valid Sudoku (without subgrids).

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