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Airbnb interview guide

Travel marketplace (stays, experiences). Known for hard multi-part coding with runnable code, a CodeSignal progressive OA (2026), a code review round (since 2024), and a separate core values interview. Updated October 2026.

Airbnb at a glance
Category Big Tech
Intern level Software Engineering Intern (12-week US summer program; 2026 posting was US remote-eligible)
New grad level G7 (Software Engineer, entry level on Levels.fyi)
0 to 3 years G7 for roughly 0 to 3 yrs (an India G7 offer in Mar 2026 went to a 2y10m engineer); G8 (Software Engineer, mid) for stronger 2 to 5 yr candidates. G9 = Senior.
Online assessment CodeSignal Industry Coding Assessment (progressive, 4 levels), reported Jul to Sep 2026 and often auto-sent after applying; live coding screens use CoderPad : CodeSignal: one task, 4 levels, score out of 600, screen share and mic on. Reported tasks: banking system (create_account, deposit, transfer; top_spenders; scheduled payments; merge accounts), cloud storage / in-memory file system (add, copy, prefix and suffix search; users with capacity; compress and decompress), task management system (add/update/get; search and priority sort; user quotas with expiring assignments; overdue report). Live screen: 1 problem, 60 min, must run.
Coding rounds 1 screen + 1 onsite coding round for most loops (second coding round replaced by code review since 2024); some 2026 India loops still had 2 coding rounds
Behavioral Four core values: Champion the Mission, Be a Host, Embrace the Adventure, Be a Cereal Entrepreneur
Timeline Hello Interview: 3 to 5 weeks from first contact to decision, plus team matching. interviewing.io: offers typically within about a week of successful team matching. 2026: the CodeSignal OA invite can arrive the same day you apply. Intern hiring runs Dec to Feb in fixed windows; new grad roles were posted late April 2026. Connect Engineering Apprenticeship (about 5 months, SF hybrid) opens in April; it requires no 4-year CS degree, at least 2 years of work experience, and less than 1 year of professional software engineering experience.
New grad pay Levels.fyi (Oct 4, 2026, small samples): G7 average total comp $175K (median $179K, n=11; average base $135K, stock $32K/yr, bonus $8K); G8 average $297K (median $275K, n=10). RSUs vest 35/30/20/15. New grad postings (Apr 2026): base $128K to $142K plus bonus, equity, travel credits. Intern: $7,900 to $8,100/month in the Summer 2026 posting; Levels.fyi Summer 2025 $49.38/hr remote. India G7 offer (Mar 2026, LeetCode): 24L base, 15% target bonus, $50K stock over 4 yrs, about 45L year-1 TC.
Official links Careers, Students, Values

Interview process

New grad

  1. Application. New grad postings appear in spring, not fall: 'Software Engineer New Grad' and 'iOS Software Engineer New Grad' posted Apr 28 to 30, 2026 (Seattle or SF, hybrid 3 days/week on-site, base $128K to $142K, <1 yr full-time experience). Postings ask for CS fundamentals plus foundational AI/ML awareness (LLM APIs, model evaluation).
  2. Recruiter screen. 30 min. Background, motivation, 'why Airbnb'. Hello Interview G8 guide says the first call may be with a recruiter or hiring manager.
  3. Online assessment (CodeSignal, often auto-sent). Changed in 2026: Jul to Sep 2026 reports say Airbnb emails a CodeSignal Industry Coding Assessment right after you apply (one Sep 2026 candidate: 'probably sent automatically'). One progressive build in a single codebase with 4 levels; the next level unlocks only after the current level's tests pass; scored out of 600; screen share and mic stay on for the whole test. Reported tasks: banking system, cloud storage / in-memory file system, task management system. A perfect score still ended in rejection a week later for one Aug 2026 candidate. Reports are labeled Software Engineer or SSE; not confirmed for the new grad postings specifically.
  4. Technical screen. 60 min live coding on CoderPad. Hello Interview says one or two problems; candidate reports usually describe one long multi-part problem (DP, graph, simulation). Code must run: interviewing.io says 'Pseudocode is not allowed' and you must write working code and run it; Hello Interview says production quality code, not pseudocode sketches.
  5. Virtual onsite. Coding (60 min, multi-part, production-quality code), Code Review (60 min, review about 3 GitHub pull requests and leave written comments; Hello Interview says it replaced the second coding round in 2024, and a Mar 2026 candidate confirmed 3 PRs), plus a system design or technical-experience round depending on level. At G7 the design bar is lower, but candidates report it still appears in some loops.
  6. Core values interview. Separate gate, often scheduled after the technical onsite. interviewing.io calls these 'Host' interviews 'conducted by non-engineers' and says 'fail these and you won't get an offer'; Hello Interview lists it as a 30-min mandatory gatekeeper. Questions map to the four values (Champion the Mission, Be a Host, Embrace the Adventure, Be a Cereal Entrepreneur). A Jan 2026 candidate (PracHub) said it ended early after about 20 minutes.
  7. Team match and offer. Post-onsite conversations with hiring managers. A Mar 2026 candidate reported hearing team match can take months (claim, not measured).

Intern

  1. Application window. Short fixed windows. Summer 2026 SWE intern posting: Dec 8 to 17, 2025 and Jan 12 to 21, 2026 (first window 'offers the best chance to be considered'), 12 weeks, BS/MS with 1 to 2 semesters left (graduating Dec 2026 to Jun 2027). Official internship page: USA summer program is 12 weeks (May to August), applications December to February, open to full-time students with at least one semester remaining.
  2. Recruiter screen. Short call.
  3. Technical interviews. Reported: two 45-min coding interviews on Zoom plus CoderPad (DSA, edge cases, complexity), LeetCode medium to hard. Source is a Nov 2025 Glassdoor intern review seen only in search snippets (UNVERIFIED).
  4. Values interview. Reported: one 45-min cross-team values interview (collaboration, ownership, communication, product sense). Same UNVERIFIED Glassdoor source. Example values prompts reported: most memorable trip, an organization you admire, a time you stood up for something.
  5. Decision. About two weeks from scheduling to decision per the same UNVERIFIED snippet. Official page: Airbnb's goal is for interns to join full time, but conversion depends on 'individual performance and business-need'.

With 1 to 3 years of experience

For 1 to 3 yrs the loop is the same centralized process (interviewing.io: everyone follows one process, grading shifts by level). Expect a 60-min system design screen or onsite round (Miro/Excalidraw) and a Technical Experience deep dive on one past project (scope and impact decide G7 vs G8). G8 loop per Hello Interview (2026): recruiter/HM screen, CoderPad coding screen, system design screen, onsite coding, code review, system design, 30-min core values. India hiring (Bangalore, 'Work from Anywhere (India)') uses the same format: a Mar 2026 India SWE loop had a topological-sort screen, two 45-min coding rounds with strict timeboxing and a dry run at the end.

Online assessment

  • Platform: CodeSignal Industry Coding Assessment (progressive, 4 levels), reported Jul to Sep 2026 and often auto-sent after applying; live coding screens use CoderPad
  • Format: CodeSignal: one task, 4 levels, score out of 600, screen share and mic on. Reported tasks: banking system (create_account, deposit, transfer; top_spenders; scheduled payments; merge accounts), cloud storage / in-memory file system (add, copy, prefix and suffix search; users with capacity; compress and decompress), task management system (add/update/get; search and priority sort; user quotas with expiring assignments; overdue report). Live screen: 1 problem, 60 min, must run.
  • Notes: Keep level 1 data structures flexible because later levels reuse them; a failing test can come from an earlier level's data handling (Jul 2026). Scores reported: 400/600 (Jul 2026), 440 stuck on level 3 (Sep 2026), 600/600 then rejected (Aug 2026). Timestamp ordering is the trap in the scheduled-payments level. Time is the main constraint.

Prepare with How to pass an OA and compare formats in OA formats by company.

Coding rounds

  • Rounds: 1 screen + 1 onsite coding round for most loops (second coding round replaced by code review since 2024); some 2026 India loops still had 2 coding rounds
  • Style: LeetCode medium to hard with an Airbnb-flavored story (bookings, stays, menus, ski runs, accounts). Heavy on DP, graphs, union-find, simulation. Multi-part: interviewers add follow-ups once part 1 runs
  • Environment: CoderPad for the coding screen (Hello Interview; interviewing.io says Airbnb uses CoderPad for technical interviews); code review round uses GitHub-style PRs; CodeSignal for the OA
  • Graded on: Working, tested code within the hour; clean names and modular functions; reasoning about complexity; ability to extend for follow-ups. Passing all test cases mattered more than reaching the optimal approach in one Mar 2026 report
  • Reported focus topics: Dynamic programming (subset/knapsack style, bitmask over items), Graphs: DAG DP, topological sort, BFS shortest path, Union-find, Simulation and state machines (board games, water pouring), Greedy scheduling with deadlines, OOP and incremental system builds for the CodeSignal OA (bank, file storage, task manager), String processing, Code review: spotting bugs, edge cases, readability, Booking/reservation system design (double booking, search, hot partitions)

Run every practice problem through the 45-minute framework and the code quality rubric.

What they ask (data)

Based on 13 distinct problems tagged to Airbnb in the last 6 months (0 in the last 30 days, 6 in the last 3 months, 65 all-time) across two open datasets of LeetCode company tags. Tags are user-reported, so treat frequency as a signal, not a promise.

Difficulty mix (last 6 months): Hard 46%, Medium 46%, Easy 8%

Most tagged topics (share of problems): Array 92%, Hash Table 38%, String 38%, Graph Theory 31%, Dynamic Programming 31%, Breadth-First Search 31%, Depth-First Search 23%, Design 15%, Sorting 15%, Bit Manipulation 15%

Watch out: Airbnb has thin LeetCode data. Weight the reported questions and the format notes above more than this list.

Most frequent problems

Ranked by frequency, weighted toward the last 30 days. Classics like Two Sum sit near the top of almost every company's list because users tag them everywhere. Solve those fast. The signature list below is more specific to this company.

# Problem Difficulty Last seen Topics
1 Design Excel Sum Formula Hard 3 months Array, Hash Table, String, Graph Theory
2 Maximum Profit in Job Scheduling Hard 3 months Array, Binary Search, Dynamic Programming, Sorting
3 Text Justification Hard 3 months Array, String, Simulation
4 Shortest Uncommon Substring in an Array Medium 3 months Array, Hash Table, String, Trie
5 Smallest Sufficient Team Hard 3 months Array, Dynamic Programming, Bit Manipulation, Bitmask
6 Detonate the Maximum Bombs Medium 3 months Array, Math, Depth-First Search, Breadth-First Search
7 Maximum Candies You Can Get from Boxes Hard 6 months Array, Breadth-First Search, Graph Theory
8 Shopping Offers Medium 6 months Array, Dynamic Programming, Backtracking, Bit Manipulation
9 Accounts Merge Medium 6 months Array, Hash Table, String, Depth-First Search
10 Smallest Common Region Medium 6 months Array, Hash Table, String, Tree
11 Flatten 2D Vector Medium 6 months Array, Two Pointers, Design, Iterator
12 Intersection of Two Linked Lists Easy 6 months Hash Table, Linked List, Two Pointers
13 Minimum Cost to Reach Destination in Time Hard 6 months Array, Dynamic Programming, Graph Theory, Dijkstra's Algorithm

Signature problems

Problems where Airbnb accounts for a large share of all recent tags across companies. These are the most Airbnb-specific questions in the data.

# Problem Difficulty Last seen Topics
1 Maximum Profit in Job Scheduling Hard 3 months Array, Binary Search, Dynamic Programming, Sorting
2 Design Excel Sum Formula Hard 3 months Array, Hash Table, String, Graph Theory
3 Shortest Uncommon Substring in an Array Medium 3 months Array, Hash Table, String, Trie
4 Smallest Sufficient Team Hard 3 months Array, Dynamic Programming, Bit Manipulation, Bitmask
5 Maximum Candies You Can Get from Boxes Hard 6 months Array, Breadth-First Search, Graph Theory
6 Detonate the Maximum Bombs Medium 3 months Array, Math, Depth-First Search, Breadth-First Search
7 Smallest Common Region Medium 6 months Array, Hash Table, String, Tree
8 Shopping Offers Medium 6 months Array, Dynamic Programming, Backtracking, Bit Manipulation
9 Flatten 2D Vector Medium 6 months Array, Two Pointers, Design, Iterator

Reported in 2025 to 2026 interviews

Questions candidates said they got, each linked to the post where it was reported.

Question Role When Source
Allocate K people to hotels: minimize number of hotels used, then total capacity Senior SWE 2026-01 post
Job sequencing with deadlines: unit-time jobs, maximize jobs and total profit Senior SWE 2026-01 post
Maximum Candies You Can Get from Boxes Senior SWE 2026-01 post
System design: booking platform that prevents double bookings, plus search; hot partitions during a big local event Senior SWE 2026-01 post
Task scheduling with deadlines and reward points: output order that maximizes reward (screen) SWE (5 YOE) 2025-10 post
Split stay / property booking optimizer: pick properties in a neighborhood with minimum total capacity >= group size, ties by fewer properties Senior SWE (screen); also asked onsite Mar 2026 2025-05 post
Most cost-effective menu order: combo items priced together, buy a required order at minimum cost SSE onsite; phone screen in a Mar 2026 report 2025-02 post
Shortest unique substring that identifies each movie title (variant of LC 3076) Technical phone screen 2025-02 post
Connect Four: simulate moves, stop on win or invalid move, print grid; well-structured code over cleverness Phone screen 2025-10 post
Airflow-style task scheduling: execution order from dependencies (topological sort) SWE (India) 2026-03 post
Ski tournament: best downhill route maximizing checkpoint points minus travel time, print path (DFS + DP on DAG) SWE (India); also SWE onsite Jan 2026 on PracHub 2026-03 post
Find duplicate accounts sharing any identifier (email, phone, gov ID) via union-find SWE (India) 2026-03 post
Code review round: review 3 pull requests, logic bugs first, then style and maintainability Senior SWE 2026-03 post
Design a group chat (WhatsApp-like) Software Engineer 2026-01 post
Board-game maze scoring with shortest path (Connect-Four-like technical screen) Software Engineer 2026-01 post
OA: 4-level progressive implementation (the same poster's earlier post names CodeSignal), extend methods each level, scored 400/600 SSE 2026-07 post
Core values: how have you contributed to a community or volunteered? Senior SWE 2026-03 post
CodeSignal OA: banking system in 4 levels (create_account/deposit/transfer, top_spenders ranking, scheduled payments by timestamp, merge accounts) Software Engineer 2026-09 post
CodeSignal OA: cloud storage system in 4 levels (add/get/copy files, prefix and suffix search, users with capacity limits, compress and decompress) Software Engineer 2026-08 post
CodeSignal OA: task management system in 4 levels (add/update/get, search by name and sort by priority, user quotas with expiring assignments, overdue report) Software Engineer 2026-09 post
CodeSignal OA: in-memory file system (copy respects the user's remaining capacity; compress halves file size and updates consumed capacity) Software Engineer 2026-08 post

Beyond LeetCode

Code Review round: about 3 pull requests, comment on bugs first, then edge cases, performance, readability; a Jan 2026 candidate (PracHub) said the interviewer stayed mostly silent while they annotated the code. Technical Experience round: deep dive on past projects to set level. CodeSignal progressive OA (bank, file storage, task manager) that tests OOP and incremental design more than algorithms.

System design

Not the focus for interns. New grad (G7): light or absent; some candidates still get a design or technical-experience round. 1 to 3 yrs (G8): a 60-min design screen plus a 60-min onsite design. Reported prompts: booking platform that prevents double bookings plus search, with a hot-partition follow-up for a big event (Jan 2026); group chat like WhatsApp (Jan 2026); Hello Interview list: chat/messaging, job scheduler, notification system, reservation system.

Start with who needs system design, then the framework.

Behavioral

Framework: Four core values: Champion the Mission, Be a Host, Embrace the Adventure, Be a Cereal Entrepreneur (official page)

What they look for:

  • An authentic reason to join tied to belonging, travel, hosting, or community
  • Hospitality toward teammates (Be a Host)
  • Ownership and creative problem solving under constraints (Cereal Entrepreneur)
  • Curiosity and resilience after setbacks (Embrace the Adventure)
  • Community involvement, mentoring, volunteering (new grad postings list this as a plus)

Questions to prepare:

  • Why Airbnb?
  • How have you contributed to a community, or what volunteer work have you done? (Mar 2026 report)
  • Tell me about a conflict, failure, tight deadline, or complex project you owned (technical experience round, Jan 2026)
  • Describe a time you stood up for something you believe in
  • Anything you really want to do in the future?
  • Tell me about your most memorable trip

Build your answers with the story bank. Company detail: behavioral guide.

Tips

  • Practice CodeSignal-style 4-level builds (in-memory bank, file storage, task manager) under a 90-minute clock: in 2026 the Airbnb OA often arrives minutes after you apply, and you need most levels done to score well.
  • Practice writing code that runs on the first try in CoderPad: Airbnb rejects pseudocode, and passing the interviewer's tests is the bar.
  • Drill DP and graph problems wrapped in long product stories (stays, menus, ski runs); a Mar 2026 candidate called the coding rounds 'super heavy on DP'.
  • Expect a follow-up after part 1 works, so leave 10 to 15 minutes and structure code with small functions you can extend.
  • Prepare for the code review round by reviewing real PRs: comment on correctness first, then edge cases, tests, naming.
  • Write 1 or 2 stories per core value, including one about community or volunteering; the values round can reject you on its own.
  • Apply in the first intern window (early December); the 2026 posting said the first window gives the best chance.
  • Check sponsorship before applying: the Summer 2026 intern posting said Airbnb is 'unable to sponsor visas for this position'. Use the H-1B check from Jugal's post: https://jugaldb.substack.com/p/how-to-check-if-a-company-sponsors
  • New grad roles posted in late April 2026, so keep applying in spring instead of assuming Airbnb only hires in fall.

4-week plan for Airbnb

Do this after you finish a core list like Grind 75 or NeetCode 150.

  • Week 1: Solve problems 1 to 20 from the most frequent list. Time-box each at 30 minutes.
  • Week 2: Solve problems 21 to 40. Re-solve any you failed in week 1 without looking.
  • Week 3: Solve the signature problems and every reported question above. Do 2 timed mock interviews.
  • Week 4: Write 8 stories for the Four core values: Champion the Mission, Be a Host, Embrace the Adventure, Be a Cereal Entrepreneur round. Do 2 full mock loops. Review the online assessment and system design notes above.

Sources

Watch out: Public 2025 to 2026 data is mostly Senior/G8+ and India; intern and new grad loop details are thin. The intern format (2 coding + 1 values, 45 min each) comes from Glassdoor reviews seen only through search snippets (Glassdoor blocks fetching), so treat it as UNVERIFIED. No official Airbnb interview prep page exists; process facts come from Hello Interview (2026), interviewing.io, PracHub, and LeetCode posts. The 'code review replaced second coding round in 2024' claim is from Hello Interview, not Airbnb. Changed recently: (1) CodeSignal progressive OA now described in 6 posts from Jul to Sep 2026 (LeetCode 8400142 names CodeSignal; PracHub posts describe bank, file storage, task manager tasks), often auto-sent on application; (2) new grad postings in Apr 2026 require 3 days/week in SF or Seattle; (3) Summer 2026 intern posting was US remote-eligible with no visa sponsorship; India roles are 'Work from Anywhere (India)'. ATS check (Oct 4, 2026): Airbnb's board runs on Greenhouse (boards-api.greenhouse.io/v1/boards/airbnb lists 154 jobs, job links carry gh_jid), so Jugal's Sep 2025 Substack line listing Airbnb under Workday (https://jugaldb.substack.com/p/stop-applying-to-ghost-jobs) is wrong for Airbnb. Only early-career SWE opening on Oct 4, 2026: 'Early Career Software Engineer, Quality Engineering' in Sao Paulo. Several LeetCode posts promote a paid question site (offerretriever); questions were kept only when the poster said they were asked. PracHub posts are candidate-submitted and 'curated and edited by PracHub'. Reddit could not be fetched from this environment.

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