5 real Kafka interview questions asked at Zomato. Upvoted by engineers who cleared the loop. Covers System Design, Technical rounds.
Zomato
Hard
System Design round
KafkaRedisAWS
Design Zomato's surge pricing engine.
When demand spikes (rain, IPL final), delivery fees increase automatically.
Cover: demand signals, pricing formula, fairness constraints, A/B testing pricing strategies, and how to avoid customer backlash.
↑ 49 upvotes · 47 engineers asked this · SDE2
Zomato
Hard
System Design round
KafkaRedisDistributed Systems
Design Zomato's delivery time prediction system. Before placing an order, show "Delivers in 35 minutes". The estimate must account for restaurant preparation time, distance, traffic, and number of parallel orders the partner is handling.
↑ 62 upvotes · 40 engineers asked this · SDE2
Zomato
Hard
System Design round
KafkaPostgreSQLRedis
Design Zomato Pro (subscription). Members get free delivery, discounts, and priority support. Cover: subscription lifecycle, prorated upgrades/downgrades, cohort-based analytics to measure retention, and how you handle payment failures.
↑ 50 upvotes · 31 engineers asked this · SDE2
Zomato
Hard
Technical round
KafkaElasticsearchPostgreSQL
Explain Zomato's restaurant onboarding data pipeline. A new restaurant submits menus, photos, and operating hours. How do you validate, normalise, and make this data searchable within minutes of submission?
↑ 44 upvotes · 27 engineers asked this · SDE2
Zomato
Medium
Technical round
2-5 yearsKafka
Explain the difference between at-most-once, at-least-once, and exactly-once delivery semantics in Kafka. Which one requires the consumer to handle duplicate processing?
↑ 19 upvotes · 10 engineers asked this · SDE2
Design Zomato's surge pricing engine.
Design Zomato's surge pricing engine.
When demand spikes (rain, IPL final), delivery fees increase automatically.
Cover: demand signals, pricing formula, fairness constraints, A/B testing pricing strategies, and how to avoid customer backlash.
Design Zomato's delivery time prediction system. Before placing an order, show "Delivers in 35 minutes". The estimate must account for restaurant preparation time, distance, traffic, and number of parallel orders the partner is handling.
Design Zomato's delivery time prediction system. Before placing an order, show "Delivers in 35 minutes". The estimate must account for restaurant preparation time, distance, traffic, and number of parallel orders the partner is handling.
Design Zomato Pro (subscription). Members get free delivery, discounts, and priority support. Cover: subscription lifecycle, prorated upgrades/downgrades, cohort-based analytics to measure retention, and how you handle payment failures.
Design Zomato Pro (subscription). Members get free delivery, discounts, and priority support. Cover: subscription lifecycle, prorated upgrades/downgrades, cohort-based analytics to measure retention, and how you handle payment failures.
Explain Zomato's restaurant onboarding data pipeline. A new restaurant submits menus, photos, and operating hours. How do you validate, normalise, and make this data searchable within minutes of submission?
Explain Zomato's restaurant onboarding data pipeline. A new restaurant submits menus, photos, and operating hours. How do you validate, normalise, and make this data searchable within minutes of submission?
Explain the difference between at-most-once, at-least-once, and exactly-once delivery semantics in Kafka. Which one requires the consumer to handle duplicate processing?
Explain the difference between at-most-once, at-least-once, and exactly-once delivery semantics in Kafka. Which one requires the consumer to handle duplicate processing?