12 of The Best Online Coding Interview Tools for Screening

As discussed in a recent post, changing developers mid-project is not ideal, to say the least. One of the best ways to avoid this outcome is to conduct a live coding interview and thoroughly screen each candidate.

Generally, a company will first give all candidates automated coding challenges to help filter out individuals who don't have the necessary experience or skills. Then, the remaining candidates will move on to a remote interview that includes real-time coding and whiteboarding.

Individuals who make it through this second round of the interview can then move on to an in-person or remote interview. If there are still many qualified candidates at this point, a hiring team might choose to offer take-home projects to give them more information to make their final decision.

There are countless platforms these days that you can use to help you with each step in the interview process, and some tools are all-in-one platforms that offer all of the above capabilities.

The following twelve coding interview tools represent a wide range of options, with some more bare-bones, affordable tools for hiring a one-off freelancer and some pricier enterprise solutions that are best suited for large companies.

1. CoderPad

Offering take-home challenges and live pair-programming interviews, this tool lets hiring teams both upload their own tasks and use the challenges created by CoderPad.

CoderPad supports more than 30 programming languages, and some integrations are supported as well. You have the choice to use audio, video, and drawing mode for the interviews you conduct.

Pricing

For one user and five interviews, the pricing starts at $50. For larger companies in need of 50 seats and 90 interviews, the cost is $750. Enterprise businesses will want to contact CoderPad for a custom quote.

Are you looking for more information about the basics of testing your developer's skills before hiring them? This guide looks at how to ensure your next developer has the necessary skills to produce the digital product you have in mind.

2. CodeInterview

Supporting more than twenty-five languages and offering both audio and video capabilities, CodeInterview is a pair-programming platform that is a popular choice for online interviews. Some of the functionalities of this software include tools for conducting interviews, screening tests, and take-home tests.

Pricing

One of the nice things about CodeInterview is that they offer a free trial so you can get a sense of whether it's going to fit your needs. They also have a pretty wide variety of plan types to choose from, including usage-based, monthly, and annual subscriptions.

You can opt to pay $5 per interview with the pay-as-you-go format or $55 per month for pro. If you pay for the pro plan annually, the price is only $49 a month.

For enterprise plans, you can request a quote from CodeInterview.

3. CodinGame

When it comes to assessing the technical skills of engineers and web developers, CodinGame has long been considered a European leader. Not only does it offer a platform where developers can play coding games, but it has a growing worldwide community. Their clients have included some of the biggest corporations in the world, including Facebook, Nasdaq, EA, Fiat Chrisler, and Winamax.

Users can get a tailored testing campaign in only two minutes using their Campaign Wizard, and more than 20 languages are supported. They also offer strong anti-plagiarism detection tools to ensure that you're receiving original work in your assessments.

You can gain useful insight from their platform, including a comparative score of candidates and the results of countless previously tested candidates to help give you a better sense of how well your candidates did.

The platform also offers a remote interview feature that is similar to Skype, complete with a live coding interface.

CodinGame was acquired by CoderPad in 2021, but they still operate as two separate platforms.

Pricing

You can take advantage of CodinGame's fourteen-day free trial to determine whether you're ready to purchase one of their subscriptions. If you pay for a yearly plan, the cost is $249 a month, while it costs $349 a month if you pay per month. For bigger companies with bigger needs, you can get a custom quote.

4. Testdome

Testdome makes hiring recommendations driven by data thanks to their custom evidence-based hiring methodology. This means that it goes beyond just being a coding interview tool. Job seekers can also use this platform to complete coding challenges to receive free certifications.

When you use Testdome, you have the opportunity to create custom questions or use one of their many pre-made tests. There are also two different question libraries, including one public library and one premium library.

Thanks to copy and paste protection, online proctoring, and other plagiarism protections, you can also be fairly certain that your candidates are actually producing original answers and work.

When it comes to statistics and insights, Testdome will sort your candidates into pass-fail groups. You have the ability to control what the cut-off score is, meaning you have control over the minimum required score for moving on to the next level of hiring.

Pricing

You can test up to five candidates with the lowest price offering, which is $100. Instead of paying for a monthly subscription, this is a pay-as-you-go service where you pay for how many candidates you are assessing.

5. Type12

If you want to test your candidates in a realistic environment using real-world problems, Type12 is worth checking out. There are more than 20 programming languages and more than 40 frameworks that users can utilize to create their own environment.

You can also use this tool to conduct video and audio interviews. Using a pre-configured set of technologies, you can create a separate environment for every interview you conduct.

Pricing

You can conduct up to ten interviews with their starting plan, which costs $19 a month. If you're planning on conducting a larger number of interviews, you can conduct up to fifty and gain access to the in-house Environment Library with their $99 plan.

6. HackerRank

There are a lot of customized and advanced features that make HackerRank a pretty great tool for online coding interviews. The service is made up of three separate tools, which are named CodePair, CodeScreen, and Insights.

• CodePair: You can use CodePair to see how developers tackle languages live during real-time technical interviews. This lets you get a better sense of a candidate's problem-solving skills and approach. It also allows you to view key-by-key playback.
• CodeScreen: This tool lets you create custom coding challenges or send predefined tests to candidates. Their pre-made tests include a question library that covers more than thirty-five languages and eight frameworks in more than 1,500 questions. You can view detailed reports of the results to help you compare your different candidates.
• Insights: Driven by machine learning, this tech talent matrix includes Assessment Quality Score and Candidate Response Score.

HackerRank is one of the big players in the world of technical hiring, with more than 2,800 clients and 188 million code submissions across all interviews and assessments. Their clients include Bloomberg, Cisco, Twitter, Goldman Sachs, LinkedIn, Stripe, and Booking.com.

Pricing

How much it costs to use HackerRank isn't as straightforward as it is with some of these other online coding interview tools. It is determined on a case-by-case basis rather than having set plans that you can choose from. In order to figure out whether HackerRanker is right for you and worth exploring the pricing options, you can use their free fourteen-day trial.

7. Codeshare

Some of these tools get pretty pricey, and Codeshare stands out as a free resource that you can incorporate into your hiring process. While it isn't a robust interview tool in the way some of these other platforms are, you can use Codeshare to send a link to candidates to share code instantly.

You won't get anything like data security options or plagiarism tracking with Codeshare, and you can't expect any customization features or support. Some big names have used this tool, including eBay, IBM, Stanford University, Microsoft, and IBM.

Pricing

Codeshare is a free tool with limited capabilities.

8. CodeSubmit

CodeSubmit is a coding assessment tool that was first launched in 2019. Their self-stated primary focus is user-friendliness and helping to identify the ideal candidate. You can use this tool to hire front-end, back-end, and mobile teams using pair programming, take-home challenges, and screening tasks.

More than sixty languages, technologies, and frameworks are supported by CodeSubmit, and you have the option to tailor assessments to fit the specific role you're trying to fill. It also integrates with Slack, Zapier, Greenhouse, Level, and your ATS, and has tools to determine whether misuse or plagiarism is at play.

Pricing

The price range for CodeSubmit starts at $99 per month and runs up to $349 per month.

9. Coderbyte

This comprehensive code assessment platform lets you create interview sessions easily, send them to your prospective candidates, and manage them all on your dashboard. No matter what plan you sign on for, you can invite an unlimited number of candidates and create your own challenges or use one of the hundreds of challenges that come along with the platform.

Beyond testing basic programming and algorithmic skills, you can also specifically test on front-end, back-end, database, and DevOps challenges.

You can also create easy-to-use interview templates with CoderByte and conduct interviews in real-time remotely. Another great feature is that you can replay your live interview sessions, which lets you more thoroughly assess whether an applicant fits both the job position and your company culture.

Pricing

You can choose to sign on for a CoderByte subscription as an employer on either a monthly or annual basis. It costs $199 a month if you pay each month, or you can save 50% by paying $1,188 for a full year.

10. Codility

You can use Codility's coding interview tool, CodeLive, to conduct remote interviews using the virtual whiteboard feature. In a shared development environment, candidates and recruiters are able to collaborate using real-life tasks.

Supporting more than forty languages, recruiters can make the interview process much more efficient by using CodeLive's predefined tasks and code templates.

This is typically better suited for larger companies looking for enterprise-level features such as GDPR compliance, SSO, and advanced security and privacy features.

Pricing

Codility's CodeLive is certainly not the most affordable option when it comes to online coding interview tools, and pricing information is, unfortunately, not made easily available. Some estimates state that the service starts somewhere around $6,000 for an annual subscription.

11. Devskiller

Devskiller offers two separate programs that you can use to interview and screen candidates. The first is TalentScore, which assists you in screening and interviewing developer candidates. The second is TalentBoost, which offers a number of features to help you hire new candidates and design career paths for your existing employees.

Pricing

The starting price for TalentScore is $499 a month, while TalentBoost begins at $999 per month.

12. Mettl

Mettl offers several solutions to technical hiring teams, including an online hackathon platform, an online coding interview platform, and a role-based simulator.

Marketed as an all-in-one online assessment platform, some of the features include:

• Background screening
• Candidate management
• Job posting
• Interview management
• Applicant tracking
• Billing and invoicing
• Assessment management
• Resume search and parsing

Pricing

Unfortunately, Mettl isn't upfront about their pricing information. While you can use their free trial to get a sense of whether it's a useful tool in your hiring process, you'll have to request a quote from the company to get a clear sense of whether it fits within your budget.

Not Excited About the Prospect of Hiring Individual Developers?

If you have a digital product idea that you want to turn into a reality, the task of hiring freelancers might be enough to make you question the whole project. The interview process can be incredibly time-consuming, and you could still end up with a candidate you're not thrilled about.

This can be particularly complicated if you hire a team of remote developers and professionals to help you produce your app or product. All of a sudden, there are a lot of moving parts and a lot of opportunities for things to go wrong or once-promising candidates to disappear completely.

If you aren't excited about the prospect of hiring individual freelancers, you might consider partnering with an established development team. At Planetary, we pride ourselves on working with companies of all sizes and would love to hear about your project.