I applied through a recruiter. The process took 5 days. I interviewed at Datadog (Madrid) in July 2025
Interview
The process consisted of five interviews: two coding interviews, one cultural interview, one with the project manager, and one system-design interview.
In my case, I failed the first coding challenge. For the cultural interview and the one with the project manager, the feedback was that I didn’t talk enough about complex projects I had contributed to in the past. For the design-system interview, I honestly wasn’t very well prepared, so my answers were very ambiguous and lacked details about the actual architectural decisions.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
The first code challenge was about matching different tags that a user could add in a multi-select list and unifying them if they belonged to the same group. I thought it required an inverted index, so I over-complicated the solution. A simpler approach using multiple loops would actually have been more effective.
The second challenge was about React and involved building a simple table, then progressively adding features like filters, sorting, etc.
For the cultural-type interviews, the questions were about previous projects and how I handled certain scenarios—for example, how I deal with situations where I disagree with my manager.
For the system-design interview, I was asked to design a dashboard that supports multiple widgets.
I applied online. The process took 2 months. I interviewed at Datadog (Paris) in Sept 2025
Interview
The interview process is well-structured and full of useful information. The recruiters schedule calls between the different steps to explain the next stages and provide guidance. My advice is to take advantage of those moments to ask questions and seek tips.
In the very first interview with the recruiter, there are a few small questions about past projects, so it’s worth preparing something in advance.
The first technical interview focuses on LeetCode-style questions, with a medium level of difficulty. The usual advice applies: think out loud and make use of the interviewer, in my case, they were very kind and understanding.
The second step was the live coding session. This one didn’t go very well for me, so I think I can share some extra-useful advice. The exercise is incremental: it starts simple, and then more parts are added, but you don’t get the full picture upfront. That really threw me off, I asked a lot of questions to make sure I wasn’t missing any trick, but that eats up a lot of time, and an hour goes by quickly. My advice is to just complete each task step by step and not worry about optimizations (for example, creating a context or thinking about virtualization).
The third step was system design. I was lucky enough to do it in person at the Paris office, which really helped, I felt comfortable, and the interviewer was very kind and supportive. The project focused on the frontend and API design.
The fourth and final step was the behavioral interview. I recommend preparing well and not improvising. I also found it helpful to take time to reflect on my career path and understand my strengths and weaknesses. Once again, I was lucky to have an interviewer who made me feel at ease.
After that, there were several short meetings to choose the destination team and for follow-ups, honestly, some of those meetings could have been emails (I had to take quite a few breaks from my previous job).
Good luck to everyone!
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Both the live coding and the system design interviews were focused on data and tables (which makes sense given the company’s domain).
So, if you’re preparing, make sure you’re a wizard when it comes to data visualization and optimization!
It's an absurd process, it takes a long time, leetcode like exercises which will be of no use for a frontend position, if you don't pass the first coding challenge, they won't inquire anything else about how you work. Not recommended.