TikTok

Software Engineer (Internship) Interview Experience - Singapore

September 23, 2026

Neutral ExperienceGot Offer

Process

The interviewer requested to switch to Chinese halfway through round 1. Round 1 featured two SQL questions, a top K LeetCode medium problem, and a stats question. Round 2 was system design, where I had to build a login system full stack in pseudo code. Round 3 was with the hiring manager. I received an offer and confirmed a start date. I prefer a 6-month commitment.

Was this helpful?

Interview Statistics

The following metrics were computed from 23 interview experiences for the TikTok Software Engineer (Internship) role in Singapore.

Success Rate

13%

Pass Rate

TikTok's interview process for their Software Engineer (Internship) roles in Singapore is extremely selective, failing the vast majority of engineers.

Experience Rating

Positive52%

Neutral39%

Negative9%

Candidates reported having very good feelings for TikTok's Software Engineer (Internship) interview process in Singapore.

TikTok Work Experiences

A balance review, working for 4 years

Staff Software Engineer • Current Employee

Singapore, Singapore

Pros: - Frequent releases (every Tue and Thu) - Large features - CV-worthy technical experience complexity - Above-average engineers in terms of market skills - Good raises if you are the highest performing in the team. - If you want money, work for TikTok but embrace all the cons.

Cons: Merge requests are enormous. Small size is 1k lines, average is 2-3k, and big size is 8k+. Management cares about tech quality on paper. They enforce company-wide static code analysis and code coverage. In practice, they don't care. Long working hours are caused by poor architecture agility. It's impossible to get above M+.

A balance review, working for 4 years

Staff Software Engineer • Current Employee

Singapore, Singapore

Pros: - Frequent releases (every Tue and Thu) - Large features - CV-worthy technical experience complexity - Above-average engineers in terms of market skills - Good raises if you are the highest performing in the team. - If you want money, work for TikTok but embrace all the cons.

Cons: Merge requests are enormous. Small size is 1k lines, average is 2-3k, and big size is 8k+. Management cares about tech quality on paper. They enforce company-wide static code analysis and code coverage. In practice, they don't care. Long working hours are caused by poor architecture agility. It's impossible to get above M+.

Good People, Language Barrier

Software Engineer • Current Employee

Singapore, Singapore

Pros: Good people, good environment. Work-life balance depends on the team.

Cons: • Chinese practically needed to function normally • Need to "manage upwards"

Good People, Language Barrier

Software Engineer • Current Employee

Singapore, Singapore

Pros: Good people, good environment. Work-life balance depends on the team.

Cons: • Chinese practically needed to function normally • Need to "manage upwards"

Fun Work, Food Poisoning

Software Engineer • Current Employee

Singapore, Singapore

Pros: Good. Work is fun, and the team is smart.

Cons: Food sometimes gives food poisoning.

Fun Work, Food Poisoning

Software Engineer • Current Employee

Singapore, Singapore

Pros: Good. Work is fun, and the team is smart.

Cons: Food sometimes gives food poisoning.

A balance review, working for 4 years

Staff Software Engineer • Current Employee

Singapore, Singapore

Pros: - Frequent releases (every Tue and Thu) - Large features - CV-worthy technical experience complexity - Above-average engineers in terms of market skills - Good raises if you are the highest performing in the team. - If you want money, work for TikTok but embrace all the cons.

Cons: Merge requests are enormous. Small size is 1k lines, average is 2-3k, and big size is 8k+. Management cares about tech quality on paper. They enforce company-wide static code analysis and code coverage. In practice, they don't care. Long working hours are caused by poor architecture agility. It's impossible to get above M+.

3.0
A balance review, working for 4 years
Staff Software Engineer • Current Employee
Singapore, Singapore
June 28, 2025
Pros: - Frequent releases (every Tue and Thu) - Large features - CV-worthy technical experience complexity - Above-average engineers in terms of market skills - Good raises if you are the highest performing in the team. - If you want money, work for TikTok but embrace all the cons.
Cons: Merge requests are enormous. Small size is 1k lines, average is 2-3k, and big size is 8k+. Management cares about tech quality on paper. They enforce company-wide static code analysis and code coverage. In practice, they don't care. Long working hours are caused by poor architecture agility. It's impossible to get above M+.

Good People, Language Barrier

Software Engineer • Current Employee

Singapore, Singapore

Pros: Good people, good environment. Work-life balance depends on the team.

Cons: • Chinese practically needed to function normally • Need to "manage upwards"

4.0
Good People, Language Barrier
Software Engineer • Current Employee
Singapore, Singapore
May 27, 2024
Pros: Good people, good environment. Work-life balance depends on the team.
Cons: • Chinese practically needed to function normally • Need to "manage upwards"

Fun Work, Food Poisoning

Software Engineer • Current Employee

Singapore, Singapore

Pros: Good. Work is fun, and the team is smart.

Cons: Food sometimes gives food poisoning.

5.0
Fun Work, Food Poisoning
Software Engineer • Current Employee
Singapore, Singapore
July 3, 2025
Pros: Good. Work is fun, and the team is smart.
Cons: Food sometimes gives food poisoning.

TikTok Interview Questions

Generate Parentheses

Given a number 'n', generate all possible well-formed (balanced) parentheses strings of length 2*n. For instance, if n=3, you need to create all valid combinations like '((()))', '(()())', etc.

RecursionStrings

Longest Substring Without Repeating Characters

Find the length of the longest substring within a given string that contains no repeating characters. The substring must be contiguous.

StringsTwo PointersSliding Windows

Search in Rotated Sorted Array

You're given a sorted array that has been rotated, and a target value. Find the index of the target value in the rotated array, or return -1 if it's not present.

ArraysBinary Search

Copyright © Taro