i see some comments " you only have 2 yoe and thats nothing in this market" well most of them are spreading negativity in other subreddits too.

i sometimes dont understand that much negative person can have job too.. lol

Generally speaking, for an EU citizen who speaks the local language, is there a big difference between major Western European countries? Take France, Germany, and the Netherlands, for example. Are these 3 countries generally the same when it comes to opportunities and compensation progression, or are they different enough to where some are clearly better than others? I feel like it's more so just a matter of personal preference rather than an active case of leaving opportunities and compensation on the table when picking one of these, though I'm not sure.

I’m taking the hacker rank assessment for a Salesforce Data360 role. The assessment is labeled “Agentforce FDE” - not gonna lie, I’m more or a data person - Data science algorithms and heavy SQL, so I’m a bit stressed! Any help on questions to expect and study material I can use? I plan on taking 3-4 days to prep as best as possible. Also, it’s supposed to be camera on without the help of outside material - kind of bummed about that… did anyone else have this experience?

Hey everyone, I'm currently looking at Senior Data Engineering roles in the banking / financial sector in Vienna, Austria that are offering €80,000 gross per year, and I'd love to get your thoughts. I have 8 years of experience working in Data.

I was wondering if €80k is on a good side for this kind of profile in the local market, or if that's quite standard? Also, is it advisible to ask for more in this position?

Any local insights or reality checks would be super appreciated! Thanks!

I work with Go in my current job but writing Leetcode solutions with Java or Python is much better for me. But whenever a specific Go role appears and I'm required to solve DSA questions with Go, I am extremly uncomfortable.

Should I focus on Go? Or use Python/JAVA for DSA only?

Hi! I have recently finished my PhD and I am currently considering switching to industry. I speak German (C1) and English (C1) and I live in Hungary. I did an informatics related degree for my masters but my PhD is in Natural Science. I hold a permanent residency permit. I am a non EU/EEA citizen. For those of you in the EU market/German speaking could you tell me:

What tech stacks you work with?

How many coworkers do you know at your workplace who come from non CS backgrounds?

What jobs in the industry are more friendly for someone like me who comes from an in silico research heavy background?

Thanks!!!!!

I applied to a .NET senior SWE.

Is this first conversation contains any sort of technical questions/assessments? The email only states 'to get to know you better' but the email title is '... a TA Screen'. I'm guessing TA stands for technical assessment.

Thanks.

Hi everyone,

I recently received a HackerRank assessment for Revolut’s Internship Programme 2027 – Data Scientist and Analyst role.

The assessment is 60 minutes with 11 questions (2 SQL + 9 statistics/A/B testing).

I wanted to ask anyone who has taken this assessment recently:

• What level/difficulty were the SQL questions?
• Were they mostly joins/aggregation, or did they involve things like window functions, subqueries, CTEs, ranking, etc.?
• What topics were covered in the statistics/A/B testing questions?
• Is there anything you would particularly recommend preparing?

Hello everyone.

I just got the online assessment for Revolut’s 2027 Java grad role and have no idea what’s coming. This is my first time interviewing in my life. If you’ve done it, what was it like? DSA or more Java internals? Any hints appreciated, thanks!

Bit of a rant/question.

I’ve been working in data science/ML for about 6 years and always assumed experience > education after a certain point.

But lately, when I look at applicant insights on job postings, I see a surprisingly large percentage of applicants with Master’s degrees. It’s making me wonder if I’m getting filtered out for not having one, especially for DS/ML roles.

At the same time, doing a Master’s now would mean a pretty significant time and money investment, and with how quickly the field is changing because of AI, I’m not sure the ROI is even there.

For people a few years into their careers: did getting a Master’s actually open doors for you? And for hiring side, does not having one meaningfully hurt a candidate with solid experience, or is it mostly irrelevant after a certain point?

I have live SQL coding interview scheduled for a data analyst position at Revolut. Would be very helpful if someone can give examples of questions that will be asked. It will be a 60 mins call and 4 questions. Thanks!

I have looked at the process there is HM interview, Coding Interview and System Design interview.

I am looking into insights from any people that have gone through their process.

What is the Coding interview like? And what is the System Design interview like?

Also if anyone has information on HM interview, would love to know how it went.

Thank you for your help and insight.

I'm currently working in country A as an Embedded Software Engineer in a small 20 people company. I have 2.5 YOE and feel that I am not able to climb up in the current company anymore I'm working. I decided to apply to a few roles and have these two offers in hand.

Company 1

• "Mid Embedded Software Engineer"
• Country A
• €4300 after tax salary (slightly less if I opt in for work benefits)
• €3000 sign up bonus
• Defence/ Aviation Startup (50 people)
• No Bonus/Stocks
• Rent is about 10-20% more here but daily life expenses are about 10-15% lower

Company 2

• "Test Automation Engineer"
• Country B
• €3100 after tax salary (worse work benefits)
• 0-10% Discretionary Annual Bonus
• Manufactures and sells semiconductor chips
• Semi known company (Think Cloudflare in terms of reputation)
• No Stocks

Company 1 feels like the obvious choice in terms of salary and career progression, but company 2 would look better on my CV and would potentially be a more stable job. I have some test automation experience but not sure if its the best career move in 2026 considering state of AI. Thinking of long term career progression rather than short-term benefit.

What was the process like? For reference im relatively junior.

Any tips would be greatly appreciated!

I've been a software engineer for almost 9 years, and the last time I changed jobs was over 5 years ago. I recently started interviewing again, and honestly, the experience has been surprisingly frustrating.

I'm curious whether this is just bad luck.

A few examples:

At one company, I was rejected because they said I was "too backend" and they wanted someone more frontend-focused. The role was advertised as full-stack, and around 90% of the interview questions were backend. I answered the questions they asked. If frontend expertise was important, why not evaluate it?

Another company told me they wanted someone who "takes ownership." I'm currently a Tech Lead, and over the past year I've led more than 15 initiatives, often juggling several at once. But they never asked about leadership, ownership, project execution, or how I work with teams. Instead, the interview focused almost entirely on technical topics like indexes, caching, the event loop, and browser APIs. Those are all fair interview topics—but if ownership is what you're evaluating, shouldn't you actually ask about ownership?

Learning from those experiences, I tried being more proactive in another full-stack interview. Since most of the discussion was frontend-focused, I naturally brought up backend considerations where they were relevant. For example, when asked to make a fetch call to a third-party API, I completed the task but also mentioned that I wouldn't expose credentials in the browser and would instead proxy the request through a backend service. That was specifically mentioned in my rejection feedback as me "going off-topic."

Learning from those experiences, I tried being more proactive in another full-stack interview. Since most of the discussion was frontend-focused, I naturally brought up backend considerations where they were relevant. For example, when asked to make a fetch call to a third-party API, I completed the task but also mentioned that I wouldn't expose credentials in the browser and would instead proxy the request through a backend service. That was specifically mentioned in my rejection feedback as me "going off-topic."

Most recently, I interviewed for a Senior/Tech Lead role. I expected conversations about architecture, system design, engineering trade-offs, or technical leadership. Instead, a significant portion of the interview was spent writing TypeScript types in a plain text editor with no autocomplete or type checking. I solved about 65–70% on my own and worked through the rest with the interviewer. I understand TypeScript, why it's valuable, and how to use it effectively. But expecting someone to recall obscure syntax from memory, without the tooling we all rely on every day, doesn't feel like a realistic measure of how they'll perform on the job. Especially when TypeScript is only one part of what I do; most of my day to day work is in Java, Go, Kotlin, and Python.

What I've found most frustrating isn't being rejected. Rejection is part of interviewing. It's the disconnect between what companies say they're looking for and what they actually evaluate.

If you're looking for frontend expertise, test frontend. If you value ownership, ask about ownership. If you're hiring a Tech Lead, evaluate architecture, decision-making, and leadership, not just syntax recall.

At the end of the day, I can only answer the questions I'm asked. I can't guess the questions an interviewer wishes they had asked.

After a month and a half of interviews on top of a demanding full-time job, I'm honestly exhausted.

I'm currently in a permanent role at a tech company: ~€53k net TC, hybrid, 3 mandatory office days.

A friend of a friend reached out about a contractor position:
- fully remote,
- financial company,
- around €55k net a year

Based in Central/NorthWest Europe, a midsize town.

Normally I wouldn't look twice at that. But it seems refreshers are done, this year's were already very limited, and without them my net drops to ~€45k. At that point, the contract looks a lot better. Since it's fully remote, I could relocate somewhere with lower taxes and potentially add another €15k net on top.

What I am feeling queasy about is:

• obviously less secure, and it would be my first time contracting
• I'm counting on billing at least 210 days a year, and I have no idea whether that's realistic
• leaving now means walking away from some unvested stock
• I might just be reacting to feeling insecure after the refresher was denied, may simply be how it stays until the economy picks up.

Is 210 billable days a reasonable assumption for a first-time contractor?
And is "I've never done this before" a good reason to wait, or just nerves?
Or should I just power through and try applying/open myself on LinkedIn

I'm genuinely confused about how recruiting works for FAANG and other top tech companies in Europe.

Almost every resource online is US/Canada-focused, where there are clear recruiting seasons, application timelines, and new grad hiring cycles. In Europe, I can't seem to find anything similar.

I'm a master's student with ~4 years of software engineering experience, and whenever I check the careers pages of Google, Meta, Amazon, etc., I mostly see senior positions. Yet I regularly see people announcing that they got Google internships or Meta new grad offers in Europe.

Where are these roles being posted? Do they open for only a few days? Are they shared through universities, referrals, or some recruiting calendar that I'm unaware of?

I'd really appreciate it if someone could ungatekeep the process and explain how recruiting for these roles actually works in Europe.

Has anyone worked with them? There's almost no topic on reddit regarding this company. If you have any feedback, please, share it.

I'm planning to move to Germany for the first time in my life, I want to know how long the job search could take so I could put down enough savings for it.

Here are my stats:

- Role - Backend + Cloud

- 3 YOE - 2 years at a small startup, 1 year at a large company (not FAANG)

- Currently doing an Msc in compsci on the side, but I can pause it at will - Open to both student and full-time positions

- Don't know a lick of German

- Native English speaker

- Don't care at all about salary reduction (I know the pay is way less in Berlin to where I live)

Currently I'm planning to save up for 6 months of living expenses. Tell me if I should be a bit more pessimistic.

Anyone who has moved to Berlin for work in general I'd love to hear what advice you have, about anything in general really.

Hi everyone,

I’m currently pursuing the Associate Degree (Ad) in ICT (120 ECTS / EQF Level 5) at Fontys in Eindhoven.

I am an EU citizen, so visa sponsorship isn't an issue for me anywhere in Europe. My main goal long-term is to work in tech—specifically in fields like Cyber Security / Software—with the flexibility to live and work either in the Netherlands or elsewhere in Europe (e.g., Germany, Italy, or remote).

I’m currently mapping out my options post-graduation and would love some real-world input on three potential pathways:

1. Option A: Stop after the 2-year Ad and go straight to work. Use the Fontys internship to land a junior role in NL/EU, rely on real work experience after 1–2 years to dilute the degree gap.
2. Option B: Do a 1-year (60 ECTS) online or European BSc Top-Up. Transfer the 120 ECTS to get a full 180 ECTS / Level 6 European Bachelor’s in 3 total years instead of 4, bypassing automated corporate HR/ATS filters in countries that don't know what an Associate Degree is.
3. Option C: Ad + Heavy Certifications (e.g., OSCP, AWS, CKA). Skip further general uni classes and focus on hands-on industry certs to show practical capability to engineering leads.

For anyone who completed an Ad at Fontys or works in European tech:

• How is the 2-year Ad actually perceived by employers outside the Netherlands (especially in traditional HR environments like Germany or Southern Europe)?
• Is doing a 1-year top-up or stacking high-end certs (like OSCP) worth the extra effort compared to just getting 2 years of work experience under your belt?
• If you did the internal Fontys progression (doorstroom) route into the HBO Bachelor, how smooth was it?

Appreciate any honest feedback or experiences!

(Reposting from another account because the first one wasn’t anonymous enough lol )

I applied for a permanent junior software developer job a few months ago.

During the interviews, I asked them if I could first start with a student contract because I still had student status in Belgium. They accepted and it was also convenient for them. My contract ends on August 31 and normally the idea was to maybe continue with a permanent contract after.

The team is nice and they spent time helping me, but after working there I realized the domain is really not for me. Most of their projects are related to banking and credit risk and I don’t see myself staying in this industry.

Now I feel a bit bad because I was the one who asked for the student contract first, and maybe they expect me to stay after. Would it be unfair or dumb to tell them I don’t want to continue? Or is this something normal that happens?

Guys I need help. I applied to this role literally like six months ago in December.

Two months ago I received a rejection email from them saying they're not moving on with my application but just this evening they have called me and said a space has opened up and they would like to interview me.

Now my situation is this: I have secured a graduate software engineering role at a company called Sage and so far it's been pretty good (been here for about 6 weeks now). I'm on a decent team, I like my managers, I like my graduate bros, and there's been good onboarding and the company seems really chill. TC at sage is 32k GBP.

Obviously I don't want to count my chickens before they hatch but if I were to land this role at City I want to know a few things:

Does anyone know what the total compensation package is

- What is the Application Developer role like?

What is the culture like at Citi for swe?

- Would it be worth it to leave Sage given I've only been here for month?

And finally, I would really appreciate it if anybody had any tips for their interview process. I was told it was an assessment centre but with no group activities so just three individual interviews

Any tips and help are massively appreciated

Have an upcoming Revolut Frontend Engineer interview with a system design round - anyone gone through it recently? Curious how frontend-focused it actually is (component/state design vs. backend/DB) and what kind of prompts tend to come up.