How to Prepare for Amazon Interview 2026 — Complete Guide
Step-by-step preparation guide for Amazon interviews. Covers what to study, how long to prepare, top resources, and 304 real questions reported by engineers who cleared the Amazon process.
Step 1 — Understand what Amazon actually tests
Based on 304 questions reported by engineers, Amazon focuses on: DSA / Arrays, System Design, DSA / Graphs, Behavioral, Domain, DSA / Trees, Data Engineering / PySpark, Product / Backlog Prioritization, AWS / IAM and S3, React / Performance, React / Core Web Vitals, React / Memory, React / Profiling, React / Hooks, Node.js / Memory, Node.js / Event Loop, SQL / Query Optimization, SQL / PostgreSQL, SQL / Schema Design, SQL / Schema Migration, SQL / Replication, System Design / Social Media, System Design / URL Shortener, System Design / Messaging, System Design / Migration, System Design / Rate Limiting, System Design / Resilience, Java / JVM, Java / Data Structures, Java / Concurrency, Python / Async, Python / GIL, AWS / Lambda, AWS / Serverless, AWS / DynamoDB, DevOps / Kubernetes, DevOps / Kubernetes Networking, Kafka / Consumer, Kafka / Exactly Once, Microservices / Saga Pattern, Microservices / Resilience, TypeScript / Generics, Security / XSS, Behavioral / Incident Management, Behavioral / Team Dynamics, Behavioral / Career Growth, DSA / Hash Maps, DSA / Sliding Window, DSA / Stack, DSA / Real-world Algorithms, DSA / Data Structures, DSA / Heaps, Performance / Latency Tail, Performance / Cost Optimization, Performance / Caching, Performance / Logging, React / Concurrent Features, React / Internals, React / Race Conditions, Java / Collections, Java / JMM, Java / Async, Python / Advanced Python, SQL / Performance, SQL / Data Migration, DevOps / Database Migrations, Security / Rate Limiting, System Design / Scheduler, System Design / Booking System, TypeScript / Advanced Types, MongoDB / Replication, Behavioral / Code Review, Behavioral / Technical Leadership, DSA / Linked Lists, DSA / Dynamic Programming, DSA / Backtracking, DSA / Greedy, Performance / Database, Performance / Architecture, Performance / Connection Pooling, Behavioral / Conflict, Behavioral / Mentoring, Behavioral / Leadership, React / Lifecycle, React / Forms, Node.js / Observability, Node.js / Deduplication, Node.js / Native Addons, Node.js / Production, SQL / Connection Pooling, SQL / Analytics, SQL / Database Theory, AWS / Messaging, AWS / ElastiCache, Microservices / Data Consistency, Microservices / Observability, Microservices / API Design, Microservices / Sagas, Microservices / Architecture, Microservices / Zero-downtime Deploy, Security / IDOR, DevOps / Incident Investigation, Microservices / Migration, Behavioral / Conflict Resolution, DevOps / Hotfix, Node.js / Deep Clone, React / Re-render Optimization, DevOps / Debugging, Behavioral / Testing, Node.js / Throttle, Architecture / Feature Flags, Redis / Cache Stampede, Redis / High Availability, Redis / Persistence, Redis / Distributed Systems, Redis / Memory, Redis / Performance, Redis / Messaging, Elasticsearch / Query Optimization, GraphQL / Security, GraphQL / Performance, GraphQL / Observability, GraphQL / Execution, DSA / Two Pointers, DSA / Stacks and Queues, DSA / BFS, DSA / Heap, React / Context, React / Advanced React, Java / Design Patterns, Node.js / Threading, Node.js / Performance, Python / Decorators, Python / Memory, System Design / Distributed Systems, System Design / Architecture, System Design / Notifications, DSA / Linked List, DSA / Binary Search, Behavioral / Prioritization, Behavioral / Communication, Behavioral / Product, Behavioral / Incident Response, Behavioral / Collaboration, Behavioral / Estimation, Security / Cryptography, DevOps / Deployment, DevOps / Database, DevOps / CI/CD, DevOps / Service Mesh, DevOps / Monitoring, SQL / ORM Performance, SQL / Indexing, SQL / Scaling, SQL / Views, SQL / Concurrency, Kafka / Consumer Groups, Kafka / Performance, Kafka / Delivery Semantics, Kafka / Ordering, Kafka / Storage, Elasticsearch / Internals, Elasticsearch / Cluster Management, Elasticsearch / Search, Data Engineering / Distributed Systems, System Design / Scaling, Architecture / Event Sourcing, Architecture / Resilience, System Design / Networking, Architecture / Rate Limiting, React / Reconciliation, Java / Spring Boot, Architecture / Microservices, Java / Resilience, Redis / Data Structures, Redis / Resilience, Security / Auth, System Design / CDN, Architecture / Database, Debugging / Production, System Design / Consistency, System Design / Concurrency, Architecture / API Design, Architecture / Migration, DSA / Heap/QuickSelect, DSA / Graph, DSA / Trie, DSA / Sorting, Java / Memory, Behavioral / Product Management, JavaScript / V8 Engine, Architecture / Developer Experience, Security / OAuth, System Design / Search, JavaScript / Language Internals, TypeScript / Migration, DevOps / Load Balancing, DevOps / Observability, DevOps / Feature Flags, Security / Authentication, JavaScript / Event Loop, React / Concurrent, React / Architecture, DevOps / Security, DevOps / GitOps, DevOps / High Availability, Security / SSRF, Java / Java 21, Java / Modern Java, System Design / Video Streaming, System Design / Leaderboard, DevOps / Helm, Architecture / Best Practices, React / UX Patterns, Architecture / Messaging, Python / Data Structures.
Step 2 — Study the right topics in order
- DSA / Arrays — 6 questions. Start here — highest weight in technical rounds.
- System Design — 3 questions. Second priority after the first topic.
- DSA / Graphs — 3 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Domain — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Trees — 8 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Data Engineering / PySpark — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Product / Backlog Prioritization — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- AWS / IAM and S3 — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Performance — 6 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Core Web Vitals — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Memory — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Profiling — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Hooks — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Node.js / Memory — 3 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Node.js / Event Loop — 3 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / Query Optimization — 4 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / PostgreSQL — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / Schema Design — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / Schema Migration — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / Replication — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Social Media — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / URL Shortener — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Messaging — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Migration — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Rate Limiting — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Resilience — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Java / JVM — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Java / Data Structures — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Java / Concurrency — 5 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Python / Async — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Python / GIL — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- AWS / Lambda — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- AWS / Serverless — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- AWS / DynamoDB — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Kubernetes — 8 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Kubernetes Networking — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Kafka / Consumer — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Kafka / Exactly Once — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Microservices / Saga Pattern — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Microservices / Resilience — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- TypeScript / Generics — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Security / XSS — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Incident Management — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Team Dynamics — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Career Growth — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Hash Maps — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Sliding Window — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Stack — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Real-world Algorithms — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Data Structures — 4 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Heaps — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Performance / Latency Tail — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Performance / Cost Optimization — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Performance / Caching — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Performance / Logging — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Concurrent Features — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Internals — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Race Conditions — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Java / Collections — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Java / JMM — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Java / Async — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Python / Advanced Python — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / Performance — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / Data Migration — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Database Migrations — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Security / Rate Limiting — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Scheduler — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Booking System — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- TypeScript / Advanced Types — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- MongoDB / Replication — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Code Review — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Technical Leadership — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Linked Lists — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Dynamic Programming — 7 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Backtracking — 4 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Greedy — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Performance / Database — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Performance / Architecture — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Performance / Connection Pooling — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Conflict — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Mentoring — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Leadership — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Lifecycle — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Forms — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Node.js / Observability — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Node.js / Deduplication — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Node.js / Native Addons — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Node.js / Production — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / Connection Pooling — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / Analytics — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / Database Theory — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- AWS / Messaging — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- AWS / ElastiCache — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Microservices / Data Consistency — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Microservices / Observability — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Microservices / API Design — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Microservices / Sagas — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Microservices / Architecture — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Microservices / Zero-downtime Deploy — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Security / IDOR — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Incident Investigation — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Microservices / Migration — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Conflict Resolution — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Hotfix — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Node.js / Deep Clone — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Re-render Optimization — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Debugging — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Testing — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Node.js / Throttle — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Architecture / Feature Flags — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Redis / Cache Stampede — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Redis / High Availability — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Redis / Persistence — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Redis / Distributed Systems — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Redis / Memory — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Redis / Performance — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Redis / Messaging — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Elasticsearch / Query Optimization — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- GraphQL / Security — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- GraphQL / Performance — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- GraphQL / Observability — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- GraphQL / Execution — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Two Pointers — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Stacks and Queues — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / BFS — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Heap — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Context — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Advanced React — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Java / Design Patterns — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Node.js / Threading — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Node.js / Performance — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Python / Decorators — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Python / Memory — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Distributed Systems — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Architecture — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Notifications — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Linked List — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Binary Search — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Prioritization — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Communication — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Product — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Incident Response — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Collaboration — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Estimation — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Security / Cryptography — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Deployment — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Database — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / CI/CD — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Service Mesh — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Monitoring — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / ORM Performance — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / Indexing — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / Scaling — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / Views — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- SQL / Concurrency — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Kafka / Consumer Groups — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Kafka / Performance — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Kafka / Delivery Semantics — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Kafka / Ordering — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Kafka / Storage — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Elasticsearch / Internals — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Elasticsearch / Cluster Management — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Elasticsearch / Search — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Data Engineering / Distributed Systems — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Scaling — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Architecture / Event Sourcing — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Architecture / Resilience — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Networking — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Architecture / Rate Limiting — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Reconciliation — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Java / Spring Boot — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Architecture / Microservices — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Java / Resilience — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Redis / Data Structures — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Redis / Resilience — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Security / Auth — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / CDN — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Architecture / Database — 3 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Debugging / Production — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Consistency — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Concurrency — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Architecture / API Design — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Architecture / Migration — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Heap/QuickSelect — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Graph — 3 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Trie — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DSA / Sorting — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Java / Memory — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Behavioral / Product Management — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- JavaScript / V8 Engine — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Architecture / Developer Experience — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Security / OAuth — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Search — 2 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- JavaScript / Language Internals — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- TypeScript / Migration — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Load Balancing — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Observability — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Feature Flags — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Security / Authentication — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- JavaScript / Event Loop — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Concurrent — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / Architecture — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Security — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / GitOps — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / High Availability — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Security / SSRF — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Java / Java 21 — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Java / Modern Java — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Video Streaming — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- System Design / Leaderboard — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- DevOps / Helm — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Architecture / Best Practices — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- React / UX Patterns — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Architecture / Messaging — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
- Python / Data Structures — 1 questions. Cover once the first two topics are solid.
Step 3 — Practice with real questions
These are the most upvoted questions engineers report being asked at Amazon:
Design a notification system (push/email/SMS) that sends 10 million notifications per day to users across time zones with delivery guarantees.
You have a Spark job that ingests 500GB of clickstream data daily. It is failing with OOM errors on the executor. How do you debug and fix it?
How do you prioritize a backlog when you have 50 features requested by 10 different stakeholders?
Design a distributed rate limiter that can handle 10M requests per second across multiple data centers. Discuss consistency tradeoffs, the choice between token bucket vs leaky bucket, and how you would handle clock skew across regions.
What is the difference between an S3 bucket policy, IAM policy, and S3 ACL? Which takes precedence?
Step 4 — Analyse the job description
Paste the exact Amazon JD into Stepkai's AI tool. It will extract the competencies being tested, score your current readiness, and generate a personalised day-by-day plan targeting your specific gaps — not a generic checklist.
Step 5 — Mock interview
Practice answering Amazon questions with AI grading. Get instant feedback on depth, correctness, and communication before the real thing.
Start practising →