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API interview questions

DevSkiller specializes in preparing API interview questions to help recruiters hiring for junior, middle, and senior-level positions. Each API test is structured to accurately screen each applicant’s abilities through a series of challenges and interview questions.

DevSkiller API interview questions are powered by the RealLifeTesting™ methodology. This innovative, testing methodology replicates real-world scenarios and presents realistic challenges for your applicants to solve. Find the perfect candidate for your business with our range of API interview questions.

Recommended roles for API interview questions

  • Junior API developer
  • Middle API developer
  • Senior API developer
  • .NET/API developer
  • Java/API developer
  • Python/API developer
  • PHP/API developer

How DevSkiller API interview questions work

The driving force behind DevSkiller API interview questions is the RealLifeTesting™ methodology. RealLifeTesting™ allows you to gain a detailed overview of your applicants’ knowledge and skill with API, from the earliest stages of recruitment. Our API interview questions provide the opportunity to test a candidate’s coding ability, problem-solving and time-management skills.

Key features

  • Analyze coding ability and not just academic ability
  • Save time and money during screening with remote testing
  • Unique user experience where candidates can use their own IDE, clone to GIT, run unit tests, and access Stack Overflow/Github/Google for research.
  • Stringent anti-plagiarism tools to ensure test accuracy
  • Observe tests in real-time
  • Automatically generated results
  • Non-technical, easy to understand reports
  • API Tests available for hiring junior, middle, and senior-level developers

Skills covered in our API interview questions

  • API
  • Laravel
  • PHP
  • PHP 7 tests online
  • Java
  • CleanCode
  • Gradle
  • Spring Security
  • QA
  • Selenium
  • Test
  • Web development
  • Spring – Dependency Injection
  • Spring

What to look for in an API developer

An API (Application Programming Interface) helps to organize code and make components more reusable. APIs allow increased interaction with software. They take an overwhelming amount of complexity happening behind the scenes and simplify this to a relatively simple set of interactions. This allows users to get the most out of software while bypassing the complexities behind that software. Like a driver who doesn’t need to understand how a combustion engine works, in order to be able to drive the car.

APIs have been around in development software for years and are very prominent. In any software project you are likely using several APIs. Tech giants like Facebook, Twitter and Google have their own. Google’s API for instance, allows users to connect their own code to Google applications like maps or translate.

In short APIs are very important and a good API developer can be vital to your business. DevSkiller’s API interview questions will help you to assess API developer candidates on the specific skills they need to possess. Our API tests are the perfect way to narrow the field or applicants and make sure you are left with the best API developer candidates for selection.

Want to get more from API interview questions?

Did you know DevSkiller API interview questions are fully customizable to your company’s needs? The DevSkiller online task wizard allows you to alter each API test to suit your own specifications in terms of duration and difficulty. You can alter the language assessed, set time-limits on individual questions and even monitor applicants in real-time. DevSkiller’s customized API interview questions offer you greater control over your recruitment process.

Looking for proof that our API interview questions work?

It is understandable to want some assurances before committing to our screening tool, after all this proof is in the pudding so they say. In 2020 DevSkiller starting working with IKEA, check out what we did for them:

With 200K+ employees in 43 countries around the world, retail giant IKEA needs no introduction. In 2020 the team at IKEA was almost finished planning IKEA talent week, one of the world’s largest employee talent events, when the Coronavirus pandemic hit. Rather than cancel the whole thing they embarked on an ambitious plan to have the whole event take place online. They enlisted the help of DevSkiller to make it possible.

One of the many activities Devskiller introduced was a coding challenge testing Golang and REACT. Beginner and intermediate level challenges were created and one of IKEA’S tech developer’s, Karsten Stiegler set the bar with his score and invited others to see if they could beat him.

With help from DevSkiller, IKEA Talent Week was better than ever with 100+ local activities transformed into one digital agenda. 38 candidates tried out DevSkillers coding challenge to try to beat Karsten and 950 signed up for online learning.

“Talent Focus Week was incredible! I felt like being on a hackathon — just 5 days x 24 hours! Even my non-tech colleagues dared and tried a DevSkiller challenge.”

Karsten Stiegler- Learning developer, IKEA Retail (Ingka Group)

Frequently asked questions

What do you do about plagiarism?

The results of DevSkiller’s API interview questions need to be trustworthy, so we go to great lengths to eliminate plagiarism. We have a number of tools in place to ensure accurate results. A range of social listening tools can be implemented into our testing, as well as screen recording. We can even check if a candidate is looking at a separate screen to their own during testing. We can also check that each candidate’s coding is authentic by automatically cross-checking entered code against code patterns already entered in previous API tests. If there is a duplication, we can determine that the candidate has cheated.

What do candidates think of DevSkiller tests?

It is important to understand that when a developer candidate is faced with a screening task to test their ability, they are usually presented with algorithm tests that don’t necessarily assess the work they actually do.

Our API interview questions are different. Our API tests accurately reflect the real work that API developers do and so it is refreshing for developer candidates to actually be given a chance to impress in a fair setting.

Candidates respond well to having the chance to use normal coding tools and normal conventions like unit testing, and cloning to GIT from a personal IDE. Our API interview questions reflect their everyday working lives back at them and once they realize their API test is not just another algorithm test, then they relish the challenge and our feedback is overwhelmingly positive.

How do candidates take a test?

The great advantage of DevSkiller’s API interview questions is that they can be taken remotely, saving countless hours of time usually spent on in-house testing.

Recruiters send out a test invite that can be made available for a specific amount of time, and candidates are invited to take part.

When working on their API interview questions candidates use DevSkiller’s state of the art in-browser IDE, or they can complete the project on their favorite IDE and then clone the project to GIT. To check their solutions work as intended, candidates can run unit tests. Once their API test is complete the results are automatically generated and a report on how well each candidate performed is sent to the recruiter.