NVIDIA Interview Experience for Site Reliability Engineer Role
This isn’t my interview experience — it’s from Praveen Singampalli, a famous YouTube influencer. Thought it’d be helpful to break down his experience for anyone preparing for a similar journey.
Have you ever wondered what it’s like to interview at NVIDIA? Especially for an SRE role?
Well, here’s how Praveen did it:
He applied through a mix of channels — LinkedIn, the NVIDIA job portal, and through a referral.
Smart move, right?
I mean, if you can get a referral, go for it. It helps speed things up!
Position?
Site Reliability Engineer (SRE)
Was there a test?
You bet! They kicked things off with a Hackerrank screening exam.
Rounds?
A total of 5–4 technical, 1 managerial.
How long was each round?
60 to 90 minutes, so buckle up!
Now let’s get into the details because this interview wasn’t for the faint-hearted.
Round 1: Technical
The first round? Well, let’s just say it was no warm-up. NVIDIA jumped straight into the deep end with all things networking and Linux. They asked Praveen some heavy-hitting questions like:
- What are DNS, HTTP, and HTTPS protocols (ports 53, 80, 443)?
- Ports for SSH, NFS, SFTP, FTP (22, 2049, 22, 21)?
- How are packets transferred across the internet and intranet?
- What’s involved in WIFI enablement and device connectivity?
- How do routers and DHCP work?
You’d think that’s enough for one round, but nope, they weren’t done:
- They quizzed him on Linux networking commands like
firewall-cmdandnmcli connection modify. - Asked about how to block IPs in Linux (hint: know your
iptables). - Wanted to know about server memory sizes — for Jenkins, Docker, Kubernetes, Prometheus, and Grafana.
- And finally, disaster recovery strategies for securing databases and managing Jenkins master-slave setups.
You can see where this is going, right? They weren’t messing around. This was about real-world scenarios and hands-on experience.
Round 2: Kubernetes & EKS Challenge
If you thought Round 1 was tough, Round 2 cranked things up with Amazon EKS and Kubernetes. They asked:
- How do you monitor and log data for EKS clusters?
- What’s the process for handling updates and patches on EKS control planes and worker nodes?
- How are worker nodes in EKS provisioned?
- How do you optimize the performance of applications running on EKS, especially for multi-region deployments?
- And for the Kubernetes pros — what’s the difference between a Helm release and a Helm chart? Oh, and how do you deploy one?
Sounds intense, right?
Round 3: System Design
Next up? System design. They wanted Praveen to design a deployment architecture for a microservices-based application using Docker, ensuring high availability and scalability. This was all about architecture and making sure things run smoothly at scale.
You know, the kind of stuff you’d better have nailed down if you’re aiming for an SRE role.
Round 4: Managerial + Technical
This round was a mix of soft skills and technical expertise. Because it’s not just about knowing your stuff — NVIDIA also wants to see how you handle real-life situations.
Here’s what they asked:
- Can you describe a difficult customer interaction? How did you handle it, and what would you do differently now?
- Tell us about a time when you saw an opportunity to do something bigger than the initial plan. How did you convince your team?
This wasn’t just about solving problems — it was about leadership, communication, and how you work with a team under pressure.
Final Thoughts
Praveen said this was one of the hardest interviews he’s ever faced. Between the deep technical questions, the system design challenge, and the managerial rounds, it was clear NVIDIA wanted someone who could handle both the tech and the team dynamics.
So if you’re prepping for an interview like this, make sure you’ve got your Linux commands down, know your Kubernetes and EKS inside and out, and be ready to talk about your experiences with leadership and problem-solving.
Because honestly? This interview was no joke.
But if Praveen made it, so we can too..
