Question bank

Interview questions, with guidance on how to answer

834 questions across 64 roles. Open one to see what a strong answer includes and common slips, then drill it out loud with Ava. New to answer structure? Start with the learning hub.

834 questions.

BehaviouralAny levelSite Reliability Engineer
During an incident, how do you keep executives and customer support updated without slowing down the engineers fixing it?
Tests: Clear communication
TechnicalEntry levelCloud Engineer
If you had to host a simple web app with a database in the cloud, which services would you pick, and why?
Tests: Cloud architecture & core services
TechnicalEntry levelCloud Engineer
What does least privilege mean in cloud access management, and how would you apply it to a new developer joining the team?
Tests: Identity & access management
TechnicalEntry levelCloud Engineer
Explain the difference between a public and a private subnet, and what kinds of resources you would put in each.
Tests: Cloud networking
TechnicalMid levelCloud Engineer
An app server in a private subnet cannot reach an external payment service. How do you troubleshoot that connection?
Tests: Cloud networking
TechnicalMid levelCloud Engineer
How do you structure infrastructure code so several teams and environments can reuse it without stepping on each other?
Tests: Infrastructure as code
BehaviouralMid levelCloud Engineer
Tell me about a time you cut a cloud bill. How did you find where the money was going, and what did you change?
Tests: Cost optimisation
TechnicalMid levelCloud Engineer
How would you set up backups for a production database, and how would you prove they actually restore?
Tests: Reliability & disaster recovery
CaseSeniorCloud Engineer
A company wants to move a large on-premises application to the cloud. How would you decide between moving it as is and re-architecting it?
Tests: Cloud architecture & core services
TechnicalSeniorCloud Engineer
Leadership asks for a disaster recovery plan for a critical system. How do you decide recovery time and data loss targets, and what design follows?
Tests: Reliability & disaster recovery
TechnicalSeniorCloud Engineer
How would you set up accounts, permissions and guardrails across dozens of teams so they move fast but cannot create risky public resources?
Tests: Identity & access management
BehaviouralAny levelCloud Engineer
Tell me about a time you had to explain a cloud design or cost trade-off to someone non-technical. How did you make it land?
Tests: Communication & documentation
BehaviouralAny levelCloud Engineer
Tell me about a time you found a problem in infrastructure nobody had asked you to look at. What did you do?
Tests: Ownership
TechnicalEntry levelSecurity Engineer
What is SQL injection, how does it happen, and how would you prevent it in a web application?
Tests: Application security
TechnicalEntry levelSecurity Engineer
Why is multi-factor authentication important, and which kinds of second factor are stronger than others?
Tests: Identity & access control
TechnicalEntry levelSecurity Engineer
You notice a user account logging in from two countries an hour apart. What would you check, and what would you do?
Tests: Detection & incident response
TechnicalMid levelSecurity Engineer
A scanner reports three thousand vulnerabilities across your systems. How do you decide what to fix first?
Tests: Vulnerability management
TechnicalMid levelSecurity Engineer
Walk me through how you would threat model a new feature that lets users upload files to share with others.
Tests: Threat modelling
TechnicalMid levelSecurity Engineer
What are the most common ways cloud environments get breached, and what controls would you put in place first?
Tests: Cloud & infrastructure security
TechnicalMid levelSecurity Engineer
How would you add security checks to a development pipeline without making engineers wait or ignore the results?
Tests: Application security