Google 2026 New Grad R1: Green-Only Wordle and Behavioral Interview

Role: Software Engineer, New Grad
Result: Not disclosed
Report time: December 2025
Application: Applied online

Coding: green-only Wordle

The target was a five-letter word. The only available query checked whether one specific position contained one specific letter, similar to receiving only green feedback in Wordle. There was no yellow or gray feedback.

The goal was to design an algorithm that minimizes the number of guesses. The candidate first proposed brute force. After a hint, they used a dictionary and discussed improving guesses with word frequency and letter combinations.

A comment asked whether the dictionary was provided or had to be built from frequency data. The source did not preserve an answer, so that detail remains unknown.

Behavioral interview

The session included about five minutes of introduction, roughly 30 minutes of behavioral questions, and ten minutes for the candidate's questions.

Topics included:

• Designing a product for different user groups
• Improving an existing approach
• Responding after discovering that an earlier method was wrong
• Handling poor work-life balance
• Helping a teammate who needs support
• Working with someone who is not cooperating
• The most challenging work the candidate had done
• Multitasking, whether every task was completed, and whether the candidate considered giving up
• The candidate's proudest achievement from the previous year
• Qualities they wanted in their next manager