The following questions are representative of what candidates have recently faced during the Airbyte interview process. While you should not memorize answers, use these to understand the patterns and expectations of the evaluation.

Technical and Coding

This category tests your core programming skills, algorithmic thinking, and ability to work with live code and APIs.

• Implement a solution for a standard LeetCode medium problem, focusing on edge cases and optimal complexity.
• Given this simple Python code for an API, troubleshoot the logic errors using your IDE.
• How do you handle pagination and rate limiting when building a connector for a third-party REST API?
• Walk me through how you would optimize a slow-performing database query that is blocking a data sync.

Infrastructure and Kubernetes

These questions assess your hands-on experience with containerization and deploying applications in varied environments.

• Walk me through the deployment process of an application on a private Kubernetes cluster.
• How do you configure and manage networking and ingress for a K8s deployment?
• Explain your approach to logging and monitoring within a Kubernetes environment.
• What steps would you take to troubleshoot a pod that is stuck in a CrashLoopBackOff state?

Debugging and Log Analysis

This category evaluates your systematic approach to identifying root causes in complex, noisy systems.

• Review this large log file, separate the noise from the critical data, and identify the root cause of the failure.
• How do you approach debugging a system where the error only occurs intermittently in production?
• What command-line tools or scripts do you rely on most when parsing massive text files?

Behavioral and Situational

These questions gauge your cultural fit, prioritization skills, and ability to manage stakeholder expectations.

• Tell me about a time you had to manage multiple high-priority support tickets simultaneously.
• How do you prioritize tasks when dealing with strict enterprise SLAs?
• Describe a scenario where you had to collaborate with a sales or product team to resolve a customer issue.
• Tell me about a time you had to learn a completely new technology on the fly to solve a critical bug.

This visual timeline outlines the typical progression from the initial recruiter screen through the final on-site interviews. Use this map to pace your preparation, ensuring you are ready for behavioral and situational discussions early on, while reserving deep technical and infrastructure review for the take-home and on-site stages. Keep in mind that specific rounds may vary slightly depending on whether you are interviewing for a Platform, Applied AI, or Support-leaning engineering role.

5. Deep Dive into Evaluation Areas

To succeed in the Airbyte interview process, you must demonstrate proficiency across several distinct technical and behavioral domains. The evaluation is designed to test not just what you know, but how you apply that knowledge to real-world data integration challenges.

Live Coding and API Troubleshooting

Unlike traditional algorithmic interviews, Airbyte heavily emphasizes your ability to work with existing codebases and external services. You will be evaluated on your ability to quickly ingest API documentation and troubleshoot broken code. Strong performance means setting up your local environment quickly, navigating the provided documentation efficiently, and systematically isolating the bug.

Be ready to go over:

• Python/Java fundamentals – Core language features, error handling, and standard libraries.
• RESTful APIs – Authentication, pagination, rate limiting, and standard HTTP response codes.
• Live debugging – Using your own IDE to step through code, inspect variables, and fix logic errors on the fly.
• Advanced concepts (less common) – GraphQL integrations, asynchronous request handling, and custom retry logic.

Example questions or scenarios:

• "Given this simple Python script that interacts with a third-party API, identify why it is failing to fetch the complete dataset and implement a fix."
• "How would you handle a scenario where an API endpoint intermittently returns 500 errors during a large data sync?"
• "Implement a standard LeetCode medium algorithmic solution, focusing on optimal time and space complexity."

Kubernetes and Infrastructure

Because Airbyte is frequently deployed on-premise or within private clouds, a deep understanding of Kubernetes (K8s) is a major differentiator—and often a strict requirement. Interviewers evaluate your ability to deploy, network, and maintain containerized applications. Strong candidates can confidently discuss the architecture of a K8s cluster and troubleshoot common deployment bottlenecks.

Be ready to go over:

• K8s Deployments & Pods – Managing lifecycles, resource limits, and replica sets.
• Networking – Ingress controllers, service meshes, and cross-pod communication.
• Logging & Observability – Collecting and aggregating logs from distributed containers.
• Advanced concepts (less common) – Helm chart customization, persistent volumes, and stateful sets.

Example questions or scenarios:

• "Walk me through how you would configure networking for a newly deployed service in a private cloud Kubernetes cluster."
• "If a pod is repeatedly crashing with an OutOfMemory (OOM) error, what steps would you take to diagnose and resolve the issue?"
• "Explain your strategy for managing persistent storage for a database running inside Kubernetes."