OpenAI interview questions

56 questions31 coding6 system design19 behavioral9 freeUpdated

This is every question in the OpenAI guide, in one list: 31 coding problems, 6 system designs and 19 behavioral questions, drawn from what candidates report about OpenAI interviews.

Each row shows the round it comes from and links to the lesson that works through it. 9 are free to read in full. The other 47 are Premium, and here you still see their round, difficulty and topic, so you know what you're walking into.

OpenAI coding interview questions

31 problems, in the order the guide teaches them. Each lesson gives the full problem, a worked solution and the follow-ups interviewers tend to add.

1Versioned Config Store: Time-Based Key-Value StoreFreeCodingMediumKey-Value Stores & Ledgers
2Snapshot the Store: Serialize and DeserializeFreeCodingMediumKey-Value Stores & Ledgers
3Out-of-Order Ledger: Balance at Any TimestampFreeCodingMediumKey-Value Stores & Ledgers
4GPU Credit Ledger: Expiring Credits, Consumed Oldest-FirstFreeCodingMediumKey-Value Stores & Ledgers
5Tokens-per-Minute Limiter: Token Bucket With Reserve and ReconcileFreeCodingMediumKey-Value Stores & Ledgers
6Spreadsheet Engine: Formula Propagation with Cycle DetectionFreeCodingHardMini Systems & Parsers
7Unix Path Resolver: Canonicalize Through SymlinksFreeCodingHardMini Systems & Parsers
8Stateful Command Interface: Layer the Features They Add Mid-RoundFreeCodingMediumMini Systems & Parsers
9Premium medium problemCodingMediumSystem Builds & Concurrency
10Premium medium problemCodingMediumSystem Builds & Concurrency
11Premium hard problemCodingHardSystem Builds & Concurrency
12Premium medium problemCodingMediumSystem Builds & Concurrency
13Premium medium problemCodingMediumSystem Builds & Concurrency
14Premium medium problemCodingMediumSystem Builds & Concurrency
15Premium medium problemCodingMediumDebugging & Refactoring
16Premium medium problemCodingMediumDebugging & Refactoring
17Premium medium problemCodingMediumDebugging & Refactoring
18Premium medium problemCodingMediumGrids & Graph Search
19Premium hard problemCodingHardGrids & Graph Search
20Premium hard problemCodingHardGrids & Graph Search
21Premium medium problemCodingMediumDynamic Programming
22Premium hard problemCodingHardDynamic Programming
23Premium medium problemCodingMediumDynamic Programming
24Premium easy problemCodingEasyResearch Engineer Coding
25Premium hard problemCodingHardResearch Engineer Coding
26Premium medium problemCodingMediumResearch Engineer Coding
27Premium easy problemCodingEasyResearch Engineer Coding
28Premium medium problemCodingMediumLosses, Sampling & K-Means
29Premium medium problemCodingMediumLosses, Sampling & K-Means
30Premium medium problemCodingMediumLosses, Sampling & K-Means
31Premium medium problemSystem designMediumDesign a Webhook Delivery Platform

OpenAI system design interview questions

6 designs, each worked end to end in its own lesson, from requirements to the architecture and its trade-offs.

#Question
1Design LLM Inference ServingFree
2Design a Training Platform (Premium)
3Design the LLM API Platform (Premium)
4Design RAG / Retrieval (Premium)
5Design Job Orchestration (Premium)
6Design a Webhook Delivery Platform (Premium)

A lock means the design is named here and its walkthrough is Premium.

OpenAI behavioral interview questions

19 questions, grouped by what the interviewer is testing. The lesson explains why each one gets asked and what a strong answer covers.

Why OpenAI (3)

All 3 are Premium

AI safety & the AGI stance (4)

All 4 are Premium

Ambiguity & shipping fast (3)

All 3 are Premium

Ownership & impact (2)

All 2 are Premium

Collaboration & disagreement (3)

All 3 are Premium

Humility & learning (2)

All 2 are Premium

Ship Joy (2)

All 2 are Premium

Read the OpenAI behavioral questions

See all 56 OpenAI questions by name

Premium opens the 47 locked questions on this page, each with the full prompt and a worked answer, and every other lesson in all 100 company guides.

Common questions

How many questions are in the OpenAI interview guide?

56: 31 coding problems, 6 system designs and 19 behavioral questions. The guide was last updated in November 2026.

Which rounds do these OpenAI interview questions come from?

Of the 31 coding problems, 30 come from the coding rounds and 1 from the system design lessons. The 6 system designs and 19 behavioral questions come from the system design and behavioral rounds. Every row in the list carries its round, so you can start with the one you have booked.

Which OpenAI interview questions are free?

9 of the 56 are free to read in full, marked Free in the list. The other 47 come with Premium, which also opens all 100 company guides.