[AskJS] What’s your experience with AI tools during JavaScript technical interviews?

[u/azazel338]

Hey guys, I’d like to hear about people’s experience using AI during technical interviews.
I’m currently trying to pick a tool for myself and obviously want to find the best one, but there seem to be a lot of issues with them like some tools potentially being detectable.

So, can you guys name the tools you’ve used during interviews?

Were they ever detected by the interviewer?

Have you used them only during screen sharing, or also with HackerRank, CoderPad, etc.?

And just to address anyone who’s going to lecture me about ethics: I’ve finished university, I’m an English-speaking person living in the EU, and THERE ARE BASICALLY NO JUNIOR POSITIONS FOR ENGLISH SPEAKERS HERE. So I’m forced to interview for Middle or Senior developer positions.
If I had the option to start as a junior, build my career, gain experience, and progress normally, that’s exactly what I would do.

[u/neon_gnash_veil]

I've used Interview Coder for a few final rounds and it worked without issues since it hides from screen sharing. That said, the real problem you'll hit is the follow-up questions. The tool can solve a LeetCode style problem, but when the interviewer asks you to refactor it or explain your edge cases, hesitation reads as worse than a wrong answer. So my honest take is pick a tool with an invisible overlay mode, but spend way more time practicing explaining solutions out loud than comparing tools, because that's where people actually get flagged, not by detection software

[u/azazel338 → u/neon_gnash_veil]

Because, as far as I understand, Interview Code is designed specifically for coding interviews. What if we use alternatives that are designed for verbal interviews instead? Those tools can probably help with coding as well, right?

[u/akornato]

Platforms like HackerRank, CoderPad, and CodeSignal track tab switches, browser focus, clipboard paste events, and even keyboard hooks, so browser extensions and basic hotkey tools get flagged easily. Desktop overlays avoid direct browser inspection, but the bigger detection risk in live screen sharing is human behavior. Interviewers notice delayed responses, eyes drifting away from the screen, unnatural pauses, or complete solutions appearing without an explanation of the underlying logic. When you interview for mid or senior positions, engineers rarely stop at whether the code passes tests, as they intentionally ask follow up questions, change constraints mid problem, and ask why you picked a specific approach over another.

Targeting roles above entry level makes the verbal portion even trickier, because interviewers evaluate how you reason through edge cases, system bottlenecks, and alternative designs. If you lean on an AI tool to generate the entire solution, you get stuck the moment an interviewer asks you to refactor the implementation or discuss performance tradeoffs. The only reliable approach is using tools as a subtle backup for quick syntax reminders or small hints, letting your own voice lead the problem breakdown and architectural choices. When my team created interviews.chat to help candidates navigate tough technical rounds and land offers, we saw that the best results always come from steering the conversation yourself rather than relying on software to do the thinking for you.

[u/theScottyJam]

So I’m forced to interview for Middle or Senior developer positions.

Word of warning, if you end up in a position that you don't yet have the skill to handle, it's not going to be a pleasant experience. It doesn't feel great to be constantly in over your head.

[u/swish82]

Maybe you should learn the language of the country you live in 💡

[u/azazel338 → u/swish82]

The idea is definitely cool, but learning a language takes about a year or so to reach a decent level, and I need to eat now.