I applied online.

I want to share my experience interviewing for a Senior Software Engineer role at NVIDIA, as I believe candid feedback can help both future candidates and the company improve its process. My first application led to a call for a Cloud role instead of the Senior Software Engineer position I had applied for. I later reapplied for the Senior Software Engineer role, and this time the process moved forward correctly.

Round 1 was a solid technical discussion on C, closely tied to the actual work expected in the role. However, it took nearly two weeks to hear back about Round 2, during which HR was unresponsive to both calls and emails.

Round 2 went well and covered C fundamentals in depth. Afterward, HR informed me that we'd proceed to a Round 3, described as face-to-face. I mentioned I was based in Bangalore and asked if a virtual round was possible. I was told yes, and that part of the team is based in Bangalore and could conduct it. I also offered to fly to Pune if an in-person round was preferred.

From that point on, I could not get any response. I called multiple times, including once to specifically let them know I'd be in Pune for 15 days in case they wanted to schedule the F2F round. No calls or emails were returned. Two weeks later, while I was still trying to reach them, I received an email stating the position had been cancelled. The same day, I noticed the identical job listing was posted again.

What stood out most wasn't the outcome — hiring plans change, and that's understandable. It was the lack of basic communication throughout:

• Unreturned calls
• No interview feedback
• A cancellation notice that didn't align with the role being relisted immediately

For a company of NVIDIA's stature, I expected a more professional and respectful candidate experience.

Both technical rounds focused heavily on C fundamentals. Areas covered included:

• Pointers — in-depth questions, not just basic usage
• Error/bug finding — given code snippets and asked to spot issues
• Competitive programming style problems
• Conceptual/design questions, e.g. "How would you implement sizeof() yourself?"