Engineering and data
A first round for frontend developers should answer three things: do they care about the parts of an interface users feel but never see, can they debug in the browser with a method, and can they work with design and product without friction. It complements your technical round. It doesn’t replace it.
Follow-ups test whether the candidate knows why an interface behaves the way it does, beyond which component they used.
What to screen for
The questions
Ask them in order. Listen for specifics: what happened, what they did, how it ended.
Strong answer
Names specific details like loading and error states, keyboard handling, long text or small screens, and how they handled each.
Weak answer
Talks only about how it looked, or about which framework they used.
Strong answer
Reproduces it with a throttled device, profiles in the browser dev tools, checks bundle size, images and needless re-renders, and measures before and after the fix.
Weak answer
Guesses one fix, like adding caching, without measuring anything.
Strong answer
Isolated it to a minimal case, found the actual cause in the CSS or the browser’s behavior, and fixed it without piling on overrides.
Weak answer
Added fixed widths or special cases until it looked right, and can’t say why it broke.
Strong answer
Talks about focus management, closing on Escape, correct roles and labels, preferring native elements where possible, and testing with a real screen reader.
Weak answer
“We add alt text”, or treats accessibility as a task for later.
Strong answer
Keeps state local by default, lifts it only when it’s shared, treats server data differently from UI state, and has an example of getting it wrong.
Weak answer
Puts everything in a global store to be safe, or can’t explain the choice.
Strong answer
Raises it before building, proposes sensible options, and checks the result with the designer instead of deciding everything alone.
Weak answer
Builds exactly what’s in the mockup and ships it, or quietly invents the missing states.
Strong answer
Explained the cost in terms product cares about, like time or risk, offered an alternative, and reached a decision together.
Weak answer
Said no with no alternative, or said yes and missed the deadline.
Strong answer
Starts from a real problem on their team, and gives an example of one tool they adopted and one they passed on, with reasons.
Weak answer
Lists the newest frameworks they want to try.
Before the interview
Quick facts to read alongside the interview. They aren’t scored.
Listen for
Avoid
Use this in LessRounds
Paste the questions into a scripted interview, add the scorecard skills, and share one link. Every frontend developer candidate gets the same questions, and you get a score for each skill with the quote behind it.
No. A spoken first round tells you how someone thinks about interfaces and debugging. Keep code for your technical round, where you can see it properly.
Ask how they’d build a specific component, like a modal, for a keyboard user. People who’ve done it talk about focus and native elements right away.
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