Amazon Interview Guide
How to prepare for the Amazon software engineer interview without guessing
This page is built from Amazon's own published prep material for software development candidates. The goal is simple: make the process easier to understand, make the page easier to read, and keep the advice grounded in what Amazon publicly says it evaluates.
What this guide is based on
Amazon publishes separate public prep pages for software development topics, the SDE II online assessment, the SDE II interview, the SDE III interview, the interview loop, and the Leadership Principles. Where this page makes an inference rather than restating a public Amazon detail, it says so explicitly.
High intent searches this page should answer
What Amazon publicly confirms
General SDE guidance
Amazon says most technical interviews require coding and system design whiteboarding exercises, and that interviewers care more about applying knowledge than memorizing details.
SDE II online assessment
Amazon's public SDE II prep page describes a 90 minute coding section with two questions, followed by system design scenarios and a Work Style survey tied to Leadership Principles.
SDE II interview loop
Amazon publicly says the SDE II loop includes four 55 minute interviews and at least one system design question.
SDE III / senior interview flow
Amazon's SDE III guide says the phone screen lasts 60 minutes and splits time between Leadership Principles and technical evaluation, followed by a five interview loop.
The biggest mistake most candidates make
They prepare for Amazon like it is only a coding interview. Amazon's own prep materials repeatedly pull candidates toward three things instead: coding quality, Leadership Principles, and system design.
- +Solving the problem but not testing edge cases
- +Using vague STAR stories with no numbers or personal ownership
- +Treating system design as optional even when the public prep pages say otherwise
A better way to think about the process
Amazon's software development interview topics page says most technical interviews require coding and system design whiteboarding, and that interviewers want to see how you apply what you know rather than how many details you can memorize. That is a strong clue about how to study: practice in a way that looks like decision making, implementation, and communication under time pressure.
In other words, study for a loop that rewards judgment. The best prep is not endless random problem volume. It is deliberate repetition against Amazon's published criteria.
How to translate Amazon's public criteria into preparation
Coding
Use Amazon's own coding criteria as your study rubric. The public SDE II and SDE III prep pages emphasize syntactically correct code, no pseudocode, edge case checking, and code that is scalable, robust, and well tested. That means your prep should not stop at getting the answer. It should include naming, structure, validation, and clear explanation.
- Practice without an IDE part of the time, because Amazon explicitly recommends getting comfortable coding outside a full IDE.
- Study arrays, strings, hash maps, trees, graphs, sorting, searching, and core data structures, but frame practice around reasoning and implementation quality.
- Say your assumptions out loud before coding, then test normal cases, edge cases, and failure cases before you stop.
Leadership Principles
Amazon's official interview loop material highlights behavioral questions, the STAR method, and the Leadership Principles. The highest value preparation here is not memorizing one polished script per principle. It is building a compact story bank with measurable outcomes, then reusing those stories across principles like Ownership, Customer Obsession, Earn Trust, Dive Deep, Bias for Action, and Deliver Results.
- Prepare stories with numbers: latency reduced, defects prevented, revenue protected, tickets resolved, users affected, or costs saved.
- Make your individual action obvious. Interviewers want to know what you did, not only what the team achieved.
- Include one mistake or tradeoff in several stories, because Amazon's own principle language values self criticism, judgment, and learning.
System design
Amazon's SDE II and SDE III prep pages are unusually explicit about system design expectations. They say to expect at least one system design question and list the core objectives as practicality, accuracy, efficiency, reliability, optimization, and scalability. That gives you a very usable study frame: design answers should be concrete, operational, and tradeoff aware, not vague architecture talk.
- Start with requirements and volume assumptions before drawing boxes.
- Talk through failure modes, operational concerns, and what happens as traffic grows.
- Use the official design objectives as a self review checklist after each mock answer.
What changes by level
SDE I
Amazon's public prep materials are less specific for entry level SWE loops than they are for SDE II and SDE III. Inference from Amazon's published guidance: entry level candidates should still expect strong coding fundamentals and Leadership Principles questions, but likely with less architectural depth than mid level or senior roles. Confirm the exact loop with your recruiter instead of assuming the same structure as SDE II.
SDE II
This is the most clearly documented public path. Amazon says the process includes an online assessment, then a four interview loop if you advance. The public prep content also makes it clear that coding, system design, and Leadership Principles all matter. This is the level where many candidates underprepare the behavioral and design pieces because they think the process is only a coding screen.
SDE III / Senior
Amazon's senior prep guide raises the bar on architectural judgment, scope, and leadership. The public page says senior engineers are expected to build stable, scalable systems, have a system wide view, and provide technical and business guidance to their team. It also explicitly describes a 60 minute technical phone screen and a five interview loop afterward.
Questions worth asking your recruiter
Amazon's software development interview topics page explicitly tells candidates to connect with their recruiter to understand the subjects and skills most likely to be discussed. That is not a throwaway line. It is one of the easiest ways to avoid preparing for the wrong loop.
- Which level is this loop calibrated for: SDE I, SDE II, or SDE III?
- Should I expect a dedicated system design round, and how deep should I prepare?
- Will the first live step be a phone screen or am I moving straight from OA to loop?
- Is the loop focused on one product team or will it be team matching later?
- Are there any language or tooling expectations for the coding rounds?
A practical four week prep plan
Week 1
Rebuild coding fundamentals around Amazon's criteriaWork through core data structures and algorithm patterns, but grade yourself on readable, well tested code rather than on speed alone. End every session by checking whether your implementation was scalable, robust, and explicit about edge cases.
Week 2
Start integrated mocksMix coding with communication. Explain brute force first, improve it, discuss tradeoffs, and test out loud. Add short warmup sessions without an IDE because Amazon explicitly points candidates in that direction.
Week 3
Build a Leadership Principles story bankWrite 8 to 10 stories that cover ownership, customer impact, conflict, failure, ambiguity, quality, and delivery. Tighten each story until you can tell it in under two minutes, then expand cleanly under follow up questions.
Week 4
Simulate the real loopRun combined practice: one coding round, one behavioral round, and one system design round. If you are targeting SDE III, make at least one mock session look like Amazon's public senior phone screen format with Leadership Principles plus technical discussion in the same hour.
Frequently asked questions
What does Amazon publicly confirm about the SDE II online assessment?
Amazon's own SDE II OA prep page says the assessment includes coding, system design, and work style sections. It also states that the coding section is 90 minutes for two questions.
How much system design should I expect?
Amazon's SDE II and SDE III prep pages both say to expect at least one system design question. The senior guide also makes system wide thinking and architecture more central, so design importance appears to increase with level.
What does Amazon say matters in coding interviews?
Amazon's public interview prep specifically says interviewers want syntactically correct code, not pseudocode, and emphasizes scalable, robust, well tested implementations with edge cases checked.
Should I only grind Amazon tagged LeetCode questions?
No. Amazon's own software development interview topics page recommends reviewing computer science fundamentals and practicing coding outside an IDE. Tagged question sets can help, but they should not replace broader preparation.
Related interview guides
This is the standard to keep for future deep pages
Clear typography, restrained layout, explicit sourcing, and advice that maps directly to what the employer publicly says it evaluates. That is a much stronger foundation than filler copy or copied community content.