I have done live coding interviews before, but this will be my first one where AI tools are explicitly expected. The interview is for a senior role, and the instructions say I'll work in a shared coding environment and should use an AI-assisted development tool, such as Cursor, Copilot, or my preferred tool. I'm most comfortable using the Claude CLI alongside VSCode. Would that seem unusual or outdated compared with using Cursor or Copilot, or should I spend the next couple of days learning one of those tools?
5 Answers
Your setup should be completely fine. They explicitly said “your preferred tool,” so there’s no reason to switch to something you’re less comfortable with. If they wanted a specific product, they should have named it. You might even get a useful discussion out of explaining why your workflow works for you.
In a similar interview, the platform had built-in AI, but the model choice and interface mattered less than the overall process. Planning first, turning the plan into acceptance criteria, and then manually checking the implementation made the work easy to evaluate. Focus on showing that you’re directing the tool rather than blindly accepting its output.
Claude in the terminal with VSCode for editing, Git, and project navigation is a perfectly solid workflow. You don’t need every feature offered by Cursor or Copilot. Just make sure you can move efficiently between the shared environment and your tool, since the wording about a shared workspace may mean there are some access or setup details worth confirming beforehand.
Use the tool you already know. Switching to Cursor for only a couple of days could make you slower and distract from the things they’re actually evaluating. Practice narrating your reasoning while you work, and be prepared to review, test, and correct anything the AI generates.
I’ve helped conduct several interviews like this, and the specific tool wasn’t important. We cared much more about how candidates broke down the problem, what context they gave the AI, how they checked its output, and whether they understood the resulting code. Be ready to explain your prompts, design choices, trade-offs, and testing process.
That shared-environment wording was what confused me too. I’ll ask them whether I’m expected to use a particular workspace or whether I can connect my usual setup before the interview.