---
title: '10 Questions You MUST Ask in Your Next Software Engineering Interview'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=xO6FmYIwYgc'
video_id: 'xO6FmYIwYgc'
date: 2026-08-02
duration_sec: 324
---

# 10 Questions You MUST Ask in Your Next Software Engineering Interview

> Source: [10 Questions You MUST Ask in Your Next Software Engineering Interview](https://youtube.com/watch?v=xO6FmYIwYgc)

## Summary

This video provides a list of ten essential questions for software engineering candidates to ask during an interview. The speaker emphasizes that asking thoughtful questions demonstrates interest and helps candidates evaluate whether the company is the right fit for them.

### Key Points

- **Why asking questions matters** [00:01] — Not having questions makes you seem uninterested and you miss out on learning about the company. It's your responsibility to interview the company as much as they interview you.
- **Question 1: Team composition** [00:41] — Ask about the ratio of junior to senior developers to understand if there are more experienced people to learn from. Team size preference is personal.
- **Question 2: Reason for hiring** [01:08] — Ask why they are hiring for this position. It could be team expansion or backfill for someone leaving, giving insight into company dynamics.
- **Question 3: Tech stack** [01:22] — Ask about the actual tech stack used by engineers, not just what's in the job description. This reveals whether they use modern technologies or legacy systems.
- **Question 4: Legacy work** [01:37] — Ask how much of the job involves working on legacy applications. Building new apps allows learning new technologies, while legacy maintenance may not.
- **Question 5: Meeting frequency** [02:03] — Ask about the number of regular meetings. Software development needs uninterrupted time, so a clear calendar is important. Some companies have meeting-free days.
- **Question 6: Why developers stay** [02:42] — Ask why developers like working there. Good answers include culture and openness to suggestions, while free snacks are a weak reason.
- **Question 7: Training opportunities** [03:11] — Ask what training the company offers, such as access to Udemy or Pluralsight, or budget for courses and conferences.
- **Question 8: Release frequency** [03:25] — Ask how often they release to production. Frequent releases indicate good testing frameworks, while infrequent releases suggest manual testing.
- **Question 9: Tech debt handling** [03:52] — Ask how they deal with tech debt. Regular meetings to prioritize tech debt are a good sign, while ignoring it is a red flag.
- **Question 10: Biggest challenge** [04:18] — Ask about the biggest challenge the team is facing. This reveals exciting projects or potential red flags like high turnover.

### Conclusion

Asking thoughtful questions at the end of an interview is crucial to show interest and evaluate the company. Tailor your questions to what matters to you, and use this opportunity to demonstrate your passion.

## Transcript

senior Engineers answering all their barrage or questions to your best of your abilities then the interviewer turns around to you and says do you have goes blank and you stare at the interviewer and you just say no I think
you answered all my questions thank you the problem is not having any questions seem uninterested and more importantly you miss out on the opportunity to find out what the companies really like it is your responsibility to interview the
company as much it is for them to interview you so before you go for that know which questions to ask the first is is a great question to ask as it shows that you're interested in the role and
what it would be like to work in that team it also gives you a chance to work out what the ratio is between Junior and senior developers are there going to be other people with more experience than you that you can learn from the size of
personally prefer working in smaller teams but it really is a personal preference number two 2. why are you hiring for this position this is a get an honest answer it could be that they're just trying to expand the team
vacancy for someone that's left or is leaving if you can get an honest answer some good insights into what it might be like to work for that company number three what does your text act look like when you're applying for a job there's
stack on the jobs description but it's always better to ask Engineers that are technologies they are using this is your opportunity to work out whether the they are or whether you will be mostly working on Legacy applications talking
about Legacy applications you can just ask outright so number four is how much of the job is working on Legacy applications I personally think the best is to be on the ground level building out new applications that way you get to
learn new technologies as well as how to design software however if most of the time you're just making small changes to a legacy application you're not going to get to learn these skills or use any of the new technologies if their systems
applications then it's worth asking whether there are plans to upgrade them or migrate them to a new platform number five how many regular meetings do software development generally requires large blocks of uninterrupted time so
you can concentrate and get in the zone of course it's hard to do that if you're constantly being interrupted by meetings if you like me and you like a fairly clear calendar then it's worth asking what meetings are scheduled each week so
you're actually going to have to do your work even better some companies do offer a whole day without any meetings such as a meeting free Wednesday this can be work but it's worth asking whether a company actually sticks to it as
day in their calendar and booking meetings anyway number six is why do you from a developer why they like working for a particular company it could be company is a good culture and they're open to suggestions from developers
however if the best they can can think of is the free snacks and drink then seven what training does the company offer many companies give their developers free access to udemy and pluralsight which can really help in you
learning all the different concepts that you need to know the top companies also can use for either taking additional courses for certifications or for visiting Tech conferences number eight how often do you do a release finding
production can be a great indicator of how good their testing Frameworks are teams that release everyday or multiple times a day generally have a lot of would expect a company to release at least once per Sprint if they're using
apple or Microsoft that are known for doing big releases infrequent deployments is generally a sign there's a lot of manual testing going on well to get through to be able to get something into production number nine
how do you deal with tech debt Tech debt is inevitable in most places but what's important is how teams deal with it and whether the company Acts give some time to address it it's a good sign if teams have a regular meeting to discuss Tech
debt and prioritize it in their Sprint so it could be worked on if a team has a lot of tech debt but no time to address it then this is often a sign that the which isn't necessarily an environment you'd want to work in finally you want
challenge this gives you the opportunity to dig a bit deeper and try and find out interested in doing maybe they're splitting up a monolith and they're trying to turn it into microservices or they're trying to move to a new tech
there's interesting things that are actually excited about working on their biggest challenge is that the company sucks and everyone is leaving insights by asking this question these are the questions that I would ask but
it really depends on what's important to you are you interested in doing company does them or is interested in doing them maybe there's a particular want to know whether they use it too make sure you ask even if you don't use
you have a passion about what you do beyond having the right skills employers are generally looking for a passionate interesting people who are going to questions at the end of an interview is your chance to show that you're
interested in the job if you have any good questions that you always ask at an comments below I'd love to hear what they are thank you for watching and I'll they are thank you for watching and I'll hopefully see you in the next video