Optiver Interview Questions

261 total interview insight submissions
Interview Experience (86%)

The Interview Experience is a score from 1 star (very negative) to 5 stars (very positive) generated based on the Interview Insights at this company.

The number you see in the middle of the doughnut pie chart is the simple average of these scores. If you hover over the various sections of the donut, you will see the % breakdown of each score given.

The percentile score in the title is calculated across the entire Company Database and uses an adjusted score based on Bayesian Estimates (to account for companies that have few interview insights). Simply put, as a company gets more reviews, the confidence of a "true score" increases so it is pulled closer to its simple average and away from the average of the entire dataset.

3.6
  • Very Negative
  • Negative
  • Neutral
  • Positive
  • Very Positive
Interview Difficulty (100%)

The Interview Difficulty is a score ranging from very difficult (red) to very easy (green) generated based on the Interview Insights at this company.

The number you see in the middle of the doughnut pie chart is the simple average of these scores. The higher the number, the more difficult the interviews on average. If you hover over the various sections of the doughnut, you will see the % breakdown of each score given.

The percentile score in the title is calculated across the entire Company Database and uses an adjusted score based on Bayesian Estimates (to account for companies that have few interview insights). Simply put, as a company gets more insights, the confidence of a "true score" increases so it is pulled closer to its simple average and away from the average of the entire data set.

3.7
  • Very Easy
  • Easy
  • Average
  • Difficult
  • Very Difficult
% Interns - FT Offers (60%)

The % of Interns Getting a Full Time Offer chart is meant to provide a realistic estimate of the hiring practices of the company based on the reviews at this company.

The number you see in the middle of the doughnut pie chart is the simple average of these scores. If you hover over the various sections of the doughnut, you will see the % breakdown of each score given.

The percentile score in the title is calculated across the entire Company Database and uses an adjusted score based on Bayesian Estimates (to account for companies that have few reviews). Simply put, as a company gets more reviews, the confidence of a "true score" increases so it is pulled closer to the simple company average and away from the average of the entire data set.

41%
  • 0%
  • 10%
  • 20%
  • 30%
  • 40%
  • 50%
  • 60%
  • 70%
  • 80%
  • 90%
  • 100%

Interviews at Optiver

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Year
Job Title
Group/Division
Location
Experience
Difficulty
Student / Prospective Monkey
Year 2024
Job Title Student / Prospective Monkey
Group/Division N/A
Location Chicago
Experience
Neutral
Difficulty
Average
Student / Prospective Monkey
Year 2023
Job Title Student / Prospective Monkey
Group/Division Investment Banking
Location Amsterdam
Experience
Positive
Difficulty
Difficult
Student / Prospective Monkey
Year 2024
Job Title Student / Prospective Monkey
Group/Division Prop Trading
Location Chicago
Experience
Positive
Difficulty
Difficult
Junior Trader
Year 2024
Job Title Junior Trader
Group/Division Sales and Trading
Location Chicago
Experience
Positive
Difficulty
Easy
Director
Year 2023
Job Title Director
Group/Division N/A
Location Chicago
Experience
Negative
Difficulty
Difficult
Director
Year 2023
Job Title Director
Group/Division N/A
Location Chicago
Experience
Negative
Difficulty
Difficult
Junior Trader
Year 2022
Job Title Junior Trader
Group/Division Trading
Location Amsterdam
Experience
Neutral
Difficulty
Difficult
Student / Prospective Monkey
Year 2023
Job Title Student / Prospective Monkey
Group/Division Trading
Location Amsterdam
Experience
Neutral
Difficulty
Difficult
Intern
Year 2023
Job Title Intern
Group/Division Quantitative Research
Location Amsterdam
Experience
Positive
Difficulty
Very Difficult
Student / Prospective Monkey
Year 2023
Job Title Student / Prospective Monkey
Group/Division N/A
Location Chicago
Experience
Neutral
Difficulty
Very Difficult

Interview Questions & Answers - Optiver Examples

Quant Trading Intern Interview - Quantitative Research

Anonymous interview candidate in Chicago
Interviewed: October 2025
Date Submitted: Apr 22, 2026
Outcome
No Offer
Interview Source
Applied Online
Length of Process
2-3 months
Application
Phone Interview
1 on 1 Interview
Skills Test
IQ / Intelligence Test
Interview
Received an online assessment consisting of a sequences section, a games section, and a probability section with negative marking. After this, the first round interview involved playing some games with the interviewer on certain bets. The next round was a poker style market making game as well as a separate behavioural interview.
Interview Questions
Valuing information, taking directional bets when not plus EV.
Sample Answer

Quant Researcher Interview - Quantitative Research

Anonymous interview candidate in Austin
Interviewed: August 2025
Date Submitted: Mar 26, 2026
Outcome
No Offer
Interview Source
Applied Online
Length of Process
1-2 months
Application
1 on 1 Interview
Interview
CV --> OA --> HR (just behavioral and motivation) --> Technical (Simulated EV Poker like game, with cards, coins and dice; Market Making and Taking)
Interview Questions
Use Kelly Criterion
Sample Answer

Software Engineer Interview - Software

Anonymous interview candidate in Chicago
Interviewed: October 2025
Date Submitted: Mar 17, 2026
Outcome
No Offer
Interview Source
Applied Online
Length of Process
Less than 1 month
Application
Skills Test
Interview
Applied online. A recruiter emailed me and gave me a week to complete the first-round HackerRank. It was a 1-hour assessment with NumberLogic, Beat the Odds, and Zap-N. The questions were honestly pretty hard and felt more like speed/logic/problem-solving under pressure than a normal coding screen.

Process was not great on the communication side. I sent a couple clarification emails and never got a response. After I finished the test, I didn’t hear back, so I was basically ghosted after the first round.

Since I only did the OA, I can’t really say much about later rounds, the office, or the team culture firsthand. My impression from the process was that they care a lot about speed, accuracy, and being able to figure things out on your own, but the candidate experience felt pretty impersonal.

Practice timed problem-solving. The time pressure matters a lot. Also don’t expect much recruiter communication.
Interview Questions
One of the harder programming questions was counting substrings in a binary string where the number of 1s had to be greater than the square of the number of 0s. It was tough because brute force was way too slow, so you had to come up with something more efficient pretty quickly.
Sample Answer

Quant Research Intern Interview - Research

Anonymous interview candidate in Amsterdam
Interviewed: November 2025
Date Submitted: Mar 12, 2026
Outcome
No Offer
Interview Source
College / University / On Campus Recruiting
Length of Process
Less than 1 month
Application
Skills Test
IQ / Intelligence Test
Personality Test
Interview
Detailed Account of My Optiver Quant Research Internship Hiring Process

I recently went through the hiring process for an Optiver Quant Research internship, and my experience was overwhelmingly negative. Here’s a detailed breakdown of the interview and assessment process I encountered:

The Automated Assessments
The process consisted of four automated tests, each with its own format and expectations:

1. Optiver – Quantitative Research Test (2025/26 – AMS)
This test presented three questions that simulated the type of problems a Quantitative Researcher at Optiver might handle on the job.
Some problems required precise calculations, while others only allowed approximate solutions, with the required precision level specified.
Candidates were free to allocate time among the three questions as they saw fit and could implement solutions in any of the programming languages supported by HackerRank.
2. NumberLogic
A 25-minute numerical reasoning test focused on evaluating candidates’ ability to quickly and accurately process numerical information.
3. Beat the Odds
A 45-minute probability assessment designed to test the application of probability theory under time pressure.
Each question had a strict time limit, and familiarity with basic probability concepts was crucial.
4. Zap-N
A series of short neuro-assessment games, each ranging from 2 to 15 minutes in length.
These games measured cognitive responses, attention, and problem-solving agility.

The Outcome and Follow-Up
After completing all four assessments, I was informed that I did not progress further in the process. Out of curiosity and frustration, I submitted a European data request a month later, which confirmed that I had scored enough points to pass the tests. Despite this, I was rejected without any additional feedback, and I was informed that I could not reapply for another eight months.

This experience left me with a very negative impression of Optiver’s recruitment process. The company:
Provided no meaningful feedback on performance.
Automatically banned me from reapplying for an extended period, despite successfully completing the assessments.
Appeared to show little concern for the candidate experience.

Overall, my Optiver Quant Research internship hiring process felt impersonal, opaque, and dismissive toward applicants.
Interview Questions
Beat the Odds was definitely the hardest part by far. You only get 1.5 minutes to answer tough probability questions, roughly 30 of them, without any pause in between. It’s a relentless stretch that really tests your focus and speed.
Sample Answer

Future focus Interview

Anonymous interview candidate in Chicago
Interviewed: December 2025
Date Submitted: Mar 07, 2026
Outcome
No Offer
Interview Source
Applied Online
Length of Process
Less than 1 month
Application
1 on 1 Interview
Interview
I applied online and received an Online Assessment instantly. The assessment consists of the following types of question: probability, number sequences, processing speed (enter codes quickly), spatial reasoning, and reaction time. After the assessment I received an email a week later scheduling me for a technical interview. This interview was a standard market making game with cards and CPUs quoting prices.
Interview Questions
Calculate the EV of the game
Sample Answer

QD Interview - Engineering

Anonymous interview candidate in Shanghai
Interviewed: May 2025
Date Submitted: Feb 22, 2026
Outcome
Declined Offer
Interview Source
Recruiter
Length of Process
Less than 1 month
Application
Interview
3hr OA after one week HR reach out 2 technical interview then onsite interview with the CTO. After one month VO-ed
Interview Questions
Most Challenging Project
Sample Answer

Software Engineering Interview Interview - Securities

Anonymous employee in Chicago
Interviewed: November 2025
Date Submitted: Jan 09, 2026
Outcome
Accepted Offer
Interview Source
Applied Online
Length of Process
Less than 1 month
Application
1 on 1 Interview
Interview
The first round was with the manager of the team. He asked me hypothetical about SQL and possible scenarios about changing the type of it from relational to non-relational.

The second one was with a senior director who asked me a bunch of hypothetical questions about training an AI model, what a RNN is, how I would go about training/testing one, and how I would use SQL queries in a Python program. Then some basic why Cboe behavioral questions.
Interview Questions
I didn't expect a question about relational vs non-relational databases in relation to my projects.
Sample Answer

Trader Interview - Prop Trading

Anonymous interview candidate in Amsterdam
Interviewed: April 2023
Date Submitted: Dec 16, 2025
Outcome
No Offer
Interview Source
Recruiter
Length of Process
Less than 1 month
Application
Phone Interview
1 on 1 Interview
Skills Test
Interview
Phone interview with recruiter followed by a problem solving virtual rounds with an employee, followed by a super day at HQ.

Combination of trading game/scenarios and desk overview
Interview Questions
Nothing off guard, but some difficult trading games where you had to profit making a market whilst remembering your position and the position of two interviewers
Sample Answer

Quantitative Trader Intern Interview - Quantitative Trading

Anonymous interview candidate in Amsterdam
Interviewed: October 2025
Date Submitted: Oct 20, 2025
Outcome
No Offer
Interview Source
Applied Online
Length of Process
1-2 months
Application
Phone Interview
1 on 1 Interview
IQ / Intelligence Test
Background Check
Interview
Application -> OA -> Behavioural -> Technical -> Technical -> Final Round (Behavioural and Technical)
All technical interviews consisted of market making games, brush up on expected value, explain your thinking and be willing to ask questions if you're stuck. About a combination of speed and accuracy.
Interview Questions
What are three non-technical traits that you think make a great trader?
Sample Answer

Campus Software Engineer Interview - Technology, Media and Telecom (TMT)

Anonymous interview candidate in Chicago
Interviewed: September 2024
Date Submitted: Oct 16, 2025
Outcome
No Offer
Interview Source
Applied Online
Length of Process
Less than 1 month
Application
Skills Test
Interview
2 coding questions like leetcode - 2hrs .Then Coding Knowledge (computer systems understanding)-20 min.Zap-N This assessment consists up to 9 short neuro assessment games. Each games lasts between 2 and 15 minutes. The assessment takes about 60 minutes to complete overall.
Interview Questions
Customer Checkout Duration-The problem simulates customer checkout behavior in a supermarket with multiple lines. Each line processes customers based on specific rules for entering, changing basket items, and item processing. Customers can’t switch lines, move to the back if they add items, and leave if they have none. The task is to process a stream of actions (CustomerEnter, BasketChange, LineService) and output the order in which customers exit the store.
Sample Answer
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