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The Lowe's Interview Process (2026)

Blog / The Lowe's Interview Process (2026)

The Lowe's software engineer interview process typically runs 4 to 5 rounds and generally takes 2 to 4 weeks from the first recruiter call to an offer. Most candidates report a clear emphasis on 'production thinking,' meaning you'll want to go beyond clean algorithmic solutions and show how your code holds up in a real, high-traffic retail environment.

Recruiter Screen: A 15 to 30 minute introductory call where the recruiter typically covers your background, tech stack, and why you're interested in Lowe's. This is mostly conversational, so treat it as a chance to align your experience with the role.
Online Assessment or Initial Technical Screen: Depending on the level and team, you may receive a HackerRank assessment with 2 to 3 DSA questions, or a 90-minute pair-programming session conducted via HackerRank or Microsoft Teams. Interviewers in the pair-programming format are generally looking for clean code and your ability to explain trade-offs out loud.
Technical Round 1: Applied Problem Solving: A 60-minute round focused on coding and debugging. Candidates often describe this as less of a textbook exercise and more like diagnosing a live system, where you're given an unfamiliar failure scenario and asked to walk through how you'd narrow down the root cause.
Technical Round 2: Architecture and System Design: A 60-minute round covering High-Level Design and Low-Level Design, with a strong focus on microservices, Kafka, and cloud platforms like Azure and GCP. You may be asked to sketch out a system you've built before and then explain how it would handle latency spikes or component failures.
Hiring Manager and Behavioral Round: A 45 to 60 minute conversation focused on team fit, past project impact, and how you handle ownership and accountability. Interviewers tend to drill into specific bullet points on your resume, so be ready to go deep on anything you've listed.

To prepare effectively, focus your study plan on these core areas that Lowe's SWE interviews consistently test:

Data Structures & Algorithms (DSA): LeetCode-style coding questions focused on arrays, hash tables, and string manipulation, typically at the medium difficulty level.
System Design (High-Level Design): Architecture questions centered on microservices, Kafka, and cloud-scale retail systems.
Low-Level Design: Object-oriented design and component-level design questions, often tied to Java and Spring Boot.
Production Thinking and Failure Diagnosis: A standout Lowe's-specific round where you debug a failing system verbally or through code, testing how you think through real-world incidents.
Behavioral: STAR-method questions focused on ownership, accountability, and connecting your technical decisions to business outcomes.
Frontend: React hooks, event emitters, and API integration questions for roles with a frontend component.

1. Data Structures & Algorithms (DSA)

LeetCode Medium is the sweet spot for Lowe's DSA rounds. Candidates from Q1 2025 onward consistently report topics like arrays, hash tables, and string manipulation as the most common areas, so start there before moving to anything else.Specific problems that have come up include Longest Increasing Subsequence, Maximum Consecutive Ones III, and Basic Calculator. These give you a good sense of the range, from dynamic programming to sliding window to stack-based parsing.For a structured starting point, work through our top 100 DSA questions to cover the most commonly tested patterns across all stages. Make sure to also review sliding window questions and arrays, as those topics appear frequently in Lowe's assessments.

2. System Design (High-Level Design)

Lowe's system design rounds in 2025 and 2026 have placed heavy emphasis on Kafka, microservices, and cloud infrastructure on Azure and GCP. A common prompt is designing a retail inventory management system, so think through how you'd handle real-time stock updates across thousands of store locations.Another frequently cited scenario involves designing a URL shortening service, which tests your understanding of hashing, load balancing, and data persistence. You can practice this type of problem directly with our System Design AI Whiteboard.Interviewers may also ask you to sketch an HLD of a system you've personally built and then probe how it would behave under peak load, like a Black Friday surge. Brush up on High-Level Design concepts and be ready to talk through trade-offs out loud rather than just drawing boxes.

3. Low-Level Design

For backend-focused roles, Java and Spring Boot knowledge comes up in both the LLD round and domain-specific questions. Expect questions on dependency injection, garbage collection behavior, and the differences between REST and SOAP.LLD questions at Lowe's tend to be grounded in real systems rather than abstract exercises. You might be asked to design a component of an order management system or model the relationships between products, inventory, and suppliers.Use Low-Level Design practice to work through object-oriented design problems and get comfortable with class diagrams and interface design before your interview.

4. Production Thinking and Failure Diagnosis

One of the most distinctive parts of the Lowe's SWE interview is what candidates call the 'failure diagnosis' prompt. You're given a broken system, such as an API that's timing out or an order processing pipeline that's stalled, and asked to walk through how you'd debug it.This isn't about memorizing error codes. Interviewers want to see your hypothesis-testing process: how you isolate variables, what you'd check first, and how you'd communicate the issue to stakeholders. Think out loud and be methodical.Retail context shows up here too. Questions often frame the failure around high-traffic events, so practice explaining how your debugging approach would change if 19 million weekly customers were affected. Grounding your answers in practical outcomes is exactly what Lowe's interviewers say they look for.

5. Behavioral

Lowe's behavioral questions follow the STAR format and center on themes of ownership and accountability. A good answer isn't just about what happened but about what you decided, why you decided it, and what the outcome meant for the team or product.Interviewers have been noted for drilling into specific resume bullet points, so if you've listed a technology like Kafka or Redis, be ready to explain how it works internally, not just that you used it. Treat your resume as a list of topics you're prepared to go deep on.Review the STAR principle to sharpen your answer structure, and use the Behavioral Playbook to practice connecting your technical decisions to tangible business results, which is a consistent Lowe's theme.

6. Frontend

Frontend candidates at Lowe's can expect questions on React hooks, event emitters, and API integration. These tend to be practical rather than trivia-style, so focus on understanding how these patterns work under the hood rather than just their syntax.For mobile-focused roles, interviewers reportedly place high value on precise terminology around Android and iOS framework components. If you list mobile frameworks on your resume, be ready to define specific concepts accurately.Brush up on React fundamentals and make sure you can articulate trade-offs in your component architecture choices, especially how they affect performance in a high-traffic retail application.

Conclusion

Lowe's interviews reward engineers who think in systems, not just algorithms, so blend your DSA practice with genuine production-context reasoning throughout your prep. For a step-by-step plan that covers every stage of the process, follow the Lowe's Interview Roadmap and work through it deliberately.