Hey Sneha,

Here's my experience on my Google Interview that I gave in August 2022 and the Preparation that I did for the same.

Interview Process

Initially the HR called me for a opening for which I am a suitable fit. Later, she shared the preparation material and then scheduled rounds starting 2 weeks later.

There were 5 rounds in total. Each round is of strict 45 minutes. First 4 rounds were related to Data Structures and Algorithms. The last round was Googleyness or Behavioral round.

Round 1 (Screening round): 

Round Type:DS & Algorithm round. 

Problem Difficulty: Easy

Concept: Array, Range based Sum

Comments: The problem looked large while looking at it, but later on it became easy when I understood it completely and ignored the excess paragraphs which were there for me to distract or not concerning with the problem.

Round 2 (Coding Round): 

Round Type:DS & Algorithm round. 

Problem Difficulty: Medium

Concept: DFS, Computation at every node before returning from every node in tree

Comments: The problem was difficult to understand as it had lot of jargons only specific to the question itself. The main thing in this round was to check my implementation speed. The solution was 60+ lines but required very careful implementation otherwise the output could be wrong.

Round 3 (Coding Round):

Round Type:DS & Algorithm round.

Problem Difficulty: Easy & Medium (2 problems asked)

Concept: Array, Pattern Recognition using Maths

Comments: There were 2 problems asked in this round. I solved the first problem in under 15 mins. The second problem was little tough to crack as it required some basic maths to build the pattern for the solution and then coding it out. The main thing in the round was to check my logical thinking and pattern recognition.

Round 4 (Coding Round):

Round Type:DS & Algorithm round.

Problem Difficulty: Medium-Hard

Concept: Matrix Chain multiplication (Rod-Cutting problem)

Comments: The problem asked was a variant of rod-cutting problem. The interviewer did not actually explained the problem. He tried to tell this problem using a game by playing with me. That was tough to understand in the realtime interview what he intended to say. Later, I realised the problem is something similar to rod-cutting problem and then I solved it.

Round 5 (Googleyness/Behavioral Round):

Round Type: Behavioural

Problem Difficulty: Easy-Medium

Concept: Past projects and Behavioral questions

Comments: Some behavioral questions were asked like: 1) If I had any conflict with my manager in the past? 2) How did I communicate on the projects where I missed timeline? etc. You can google some common behavioral questions pretty easily.

After all the rounds, I received call from the HR saying that I have cleared the interview process but the hiring across all teams have been put on hold :( 

Eventually, I let go off the whole interview process and made peace with it.

Preparation

I prepared using the following things:

1. Basics First: Refer ANY source and prepare a basic list of data structures and try to solve Medium and Hard questions only.
2. Timing your coding: Whenever you are coding, just time your coding speed for solutions and retrospect later what could have been done better to achieve solution faster.
3. Pick any one platform: I would highly recommend sticking to Leetcode for this.
4. Mock Interviews: Ask your friends/new people from LinkedIn to take a mock interview of you to help you grill on data structures and algorithms.
5. Past Archives: AtLast, lookup to atleast 20 archives/interview experiences of other people who have given recent interviews. This is the best way to know what level of difficulty questions to expect.

At last, please do remember it's not the attempts that will be counted at the end, but the level of effort you put and the new things you learnt while giving interviews.

Let me know if I can be of anymore help. Feel free to connect.

Cheers!