Better pilots 48‑hour product build interview
Hiring at Better is shifting away from algorithm puzzles toward 48‑hour product builds judged with AI plus a video explainer of architecture and tradeoffs — a move the company says emphasizes system thinking over whiteboard coding reported. It’s an explicit signal that timed, practical engineering assignments are gaining traction as alternatives to classic DSA interviews.
Better x.com the pilot details in a public post that first surfaced the 48‑hour product build format. The 48‑hour window echoes industry hackathons such as JetBrains’ May 2025 internal event where 145 employees produced 41 prototypes over a 48‑hour sprint blog.jetbrains.com. The move sits inside a broader hiring shift: the community‑maintained "Hiring Without Whiteboards" repository lists hundreds (900+) of companies that avoid traditional whiteboard puzzles in favor of work‑sample assessments github.com. Third‑party vendors are already operationalizing AI scoring — Karat launched an AI‑enabled evaluation product and cited a training dataset drawn from over 600,000 interviews in its 2025 NextGen announcement morningstar.com. Enterprise assessment publishers are pushing similar tooling: Criteria Corp released "Interview Intelligence" for automated scoring in May 2025 criteriacorp.com, while HackerRank and CodeSignal published AI‑assisted IDE options for live and take‑home coding evaluations in 2025 hackerrank.com. Observers flag operational and fairness risks — a December 2025 review warned AI interview scoring can introduce bias and compliance challenges thedailyhire.com — even as product‑centric hiring leans into "API composition" and rapid MVP sprints as dominant practical skills for 2026 magichour.ai.
