Cognizant Technology Solutions Data Engineer Interview Guide

The Cognizant Technology Solutions data engineer loop, round by round: what each stage tests, example questions with the guidance interviewers actually score, the mistakes that sink strong candidates, and how to prepare.

Last updated: September 23, 2026Proudly published by: Jeff Wahl

10 real Cognizant Technology Solutions interview questions

Reported by candidates from real loops, sorted by domain, round, level, and year. Expand for what the round is scoring.

SQLL5 · 2021

1.how to get duplicatesn in SQL

Phone screen · screen sql

SQLL5 · 2021

Window Functions

Phone screen · screen sql

SQLL5 · 2021

Aggregate Functions

Phone screen · screen sql

SQLL5

1.how to get duplicatesn in SQL

Technical · screen

PythonL5 · 2022

Explain about data structures Difference between array an linked list what is meant by circular linked list explain about SQL statements

Phone screen · screen sql

PythonL5 · 2022

Occurance of a number in a list. Optimised solution.

Phone screen · screen sql

PythonL5 · 2022

Convert string to its number notation following its mapping.

Phone screen · screen sql

PythonL5 · 2022

2. List program in Python

Online assessment

PythonL5 · 2021

Lambda Functions

Phone screen · screen sql

PythonL5 · 2021

Data Structures

Phone screen · screen sql

How candidates rate the Cognizant Technology Solutions loop

How hard candidates rated the loop and how they felt, summarized across the reports below.

How hard candidates rated it

Easy

Medium

73%

Hard

18%

11 rated reports

How candidates felt

Positive

70%

Neutral

Negative

30%

10 rated Cognizant Technology Solutions reports

Try a Cognizant Technology Solutions-style SQL round

Find every user active on 3 or more CONSECUTIVE days. This gaps-and-islands shape shows up in nearly every DE SQL round. Edit the query and run it against the seed data.

	-- Users active on 3+ consecutive days.
	-- Hint: date minus a per-user ROW_NUMBER is constant within a streak.
	WITH streaks AS (
	SELECT
	user_id,
	activity_date,
	activity_date - CAST(
	(ROW_NUMBER() OVER (
	PARTITION BY user_id
	ORDER BY activity_date
	))
	AS INT
	) AS grp
	FROM user_sessions
	)

	SELECT
	user_id
	FROM streaks
	GROUP BY user_id, grp
	HAVING COUNT(*) >= 3

Cognizant Technology Solutions is hiring data engineers now

The roles behind this loop. Prep against the levels and locations they are actually filling.

Open roles

Cognizant Technology Solutions data engineer · live from career pages

open roles

London

top metro

Architect complex, high-volume data platforms spanning batch, real-time, and streaming pipelines using Azure Synapse Analytics, Azure Data Factory, Azure Databricks, Event Hubs/Stream Analytics, and Data Lake Storage Gen2.

L5Wilmington

Architect, design, cost and plan solutions that will support delivery teams as those solutions are implemented into live services.

L5London

BR We are seeking a highly skilled Data Engineer to design, build, and maintain scalable data infrastructure and pipelines.

L4Kraków

Build and maintain feature stores with support for both batch and real-time features.

L5San Francisco

Build and maintain scalable data pipelines on Azure.

L4Bengaluru

· Build and orchestrate ETL/ELT workflows using AWS Glue and AWS Step Functions.

L4Singapore

Build and orchestrate ingestion and transformation pipelines in Azure Data Factory using mapping and data flows, linked services, datasets, triggers, and parameterized, metadata-driven frameworks.

L4Milwaukee

Design and deliver end-to-end data architecture solutions leveraging BigQuery, Cloud SQL, AlloyDB, and Python to support large-scale transportation and logistics analytics.

L4Parsippany

Build and optimize scalable data pipelines using Python and PySpark to ingest, transform, and validate large volumes of data.

L5Multiple locations

Design and build scalable batch and near real-time data ingestion pipelines using Snowpipe and Snowpipe Streaming.

L5Phoenix

Where they hire

London

Bangalore

San Francisco Bay Area

Levels hiring

L45L55

Updated Sep 23, 202637 open listings across 3 cities

Cognizant Technology Solutions compensation and culture

The numbers, tech stack, and team structure live on the company overview.

Data engineering at Cognizant Technology Solutions

The role, comp by level, tech stack, teams, and culture signals.

Cognizant Technology Solutions salary detail

Full compensation breakdown by level, from verified salary reports.

Compare Cognizant Technology Solutions with other data engineering employers

How the role, pay, and loop stack up against peer companies.

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Data engineering at Amazon

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Data engineering at Apple

Compare the role, comp, and interview loop.

Data engineering at Databricks

Compare the role, comp, and interview loop.

02 / Why practice

Prepare at Cognizant Technology Solutions interview difficulty

01
Reading a solution is not the same as writing one
Every engineer who has frozen on a query they had read a dozen times knows the gap. The only preparation that closes it is producing the answer yourself, under time, before the interview does it for you
02
76% of hiring managers reject on the coding task, not the resume
From HackerRank's 2024 Developer Skills Report. Candidates who look strong on paper still fail the live screen if they haven't done timed, executable practice
03
5 problem shapes cover 80% of data engineer loops
Dedup, sessionization, top-N-per-group, slowly-changing dimensions, partition tricks. Writing the shapes by hand turns the unfamiliar into pattern recognition

Practice Cognizant Technology Solutions-level SQL

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