Want a software job at Google? Bring your AI wingman.
The company is piloting a new interview process that allows the use of AI assistants for software engineering candidates, according to an internal document reviewed by Business Insider.
The changes are part of a broader overhaul of Google’s interview process, which the document says is being made “to better align with modern engineering environments.”
Google will test the new format, which applies to junior-to-mid-level roles, with some teams in the U.S. and, if successful, plan to expand it later across the company and regions.
Starting in the second half of this year, Google will allow the use of “approved” AI assistants during the “Code Understanding” round. The document states that candidates are expected to “read, debug, and optimize” existing code databases.
“Interviewers will assess Al’s fluency, including rapid engineering, output validation, and debugging skills,” it adds.
A Google spokesperson confirmed the plan and said its AI model Gemini will be the AI assistant used by candidates during the testing phase.
“We’re constantly evolving our interview process to ensure we’re recruiting and hiring the best talent,” Brian Ong, vice president of recruiting at Google, told Business Insider. “As part of this, we are rolling out a software engineering interview pilot to better reflect how our teams operate in the AI era.”
The new interview process reflects the major changes AI is bringing to the software developer role. In late 2025, Anthropic and OpenAI announced a new model that dramatically increases the capabilities of coding agents.
Three-quarters of new code created within Google is now generated by AI, the company announced in April. The same changes are occurring elsewhere. Greg Brockman, president of OpenAI, recently said that AI has gone from writing 20% of the code to 80%.
“Human-led, AI-supported”
Google’s document outlines several other changes the company plans to make to its interview process, which will be piloted first.
The Googleness and Leadership round has typically focused on behavioral questions, but will now also include technical design discussions of candidates’ past projects.
For more junior candidates, one of the technical rounds will be replaced with an interview where they will be required to “tack on a never-ending set of engineering challenges,” the document says.
The company plans to pilot the new format across multiple organizations this month, including its cloud and platform and devices divisions.
Google’s move follows one that some tech startups have been using for some time. Graphic design giant Canva and AI coding startup Cognition are among the companies allowing candidates to use AI in technical interviews.
Emily Cohen, director of human resources and operations at AI coding company Cognition, said last week that her company has changed its interview process to incorporate the use of AI.
“I think it’s like letting a kid take a math test without using a calculator,” she said of not allowing the use of AI in interviews. “For most of the building of things similar to what you do in your role, you can and should use AI tools.”
Google’s new interview process document describes it as “human-driven, AI-assisted” and says the format should better simulate the “GenAl-era workflow” of software engineers.
Additional reporting from Shubhangi Goel.
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