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Data Engineer

100 Data Engineer interview questions

Only coding challenges
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Data Modeling and Database Design


  • 1.

    What is data modeling and why is it important?

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  • 2.

    Explain the difference between conceptual, logical, and physical data models.

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  • 3.

    What are the key steps in the data modeling process?

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  • 4.

    Describe the different types of relationships in a relational database.

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  • 5.

    What is normalization and why is it used in database design?

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  • 6.

    Explain the difference between OLTP and OLAP systems.

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  • 7.

    What is a star schema and when would you use it?

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  • 8.

    Describe the concept of slowly changing dimensions (SCDs) in data warehousing.

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  • 9.

    What is a fact table and how does it differ from a dimension table?

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  • 10.

    Explain the purpose of surrogate keys in data modeling.

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Data Warehousing and ETL


  • 11.

    What is a data warehouse and its key characteristics?

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  • 12.

    Explain the ETL (Extract, Transform, Load) process and its stages.

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  • 13.

    What are the common challenges faced during ETL processes?

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  • 14.

    Describe the difference between full load and incremental load in ETL.

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  • 15.

    What is data staging and why is it important in ETL?

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  • 16.

    Explain the concept of data lineage and its significance in data warehousing.

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  • 17.

    What are the benefits of using a data warehouse?

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  • 18.

    Describe the role of data quality in ETL processes.

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  • 19.

    What is a slowly changing dimension (SCD) and how is it handled in ETL?

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  • 20.

    Explain the difference between a data warehouse and a data mart.

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Big Data Technologies


  • 21.

    What is Hadoop and its core components?

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  • 22.

    Explain the difference between Hadoop and Spark.

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  • 23.

    What is MapReduce and how does it work?

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  • 24.

    Describe the role of HDFS in Hadoop.

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  • 25.

    What is Hive and how is it used in big data processing?

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  • 26.

    Explain the concept of data partitioning in Hadoop.

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  • 27.

    What is Kafka and its use cases in data engineering?

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  • 28.

    Describe the difference between batch processing and stream processing.

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  • 29.

    What is Cassandra and its key features?

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  • 30.

    Explain the concept of data replication in Hadoop.

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Data Processing and Transformation


  • 31.

    What is data processing and its stages?

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  • 32.

    Explain the difference between batch processing and real-time processing.

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  • 33.

    What are the common data transformation techniques?

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  • 34.

    Describe the role of data cleansing in data processing.

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  • 35.

    What is data enrichment and why is it important?

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  • 36.

    Explain the concept of data aggregation and its use cases.

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  • 37.

    What is data deduplication and how is it achieved?

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  • 38.

    Describe the difference between data filtering and data sorting.

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  • 39.

    What is data normalization and its techniques?

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  • 40.

    Explain the purpose of data validation in data processing.

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Data Integration and Pipelines


  • 41.

    What is data integration and its challenges?

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  • 42.

    Explain the difference between ETL and ELT approaches.

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  • 43.

    What are the common data integration patterns?

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  • 44.

    Describe the role of data pipelines in data engineering.

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  • 45.

    What is a data lake and how does it differ from a data warehouse?

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  • 46.

    Explain the concept of data ingestion and its methods.

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  • 47.

    What is change data capture (CDC) and its use cases?

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  • 48.

    Describe the difference between batch and streaming data integration.

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  • 49.

    What is data replication and its techniques?

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  • 50.

    Explain the purpose of data orchestration in data pipelines.

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Data Storage and Retrieval


  • 51.

    What is a database management system (DBMS) and its types?

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  • 52.

    Explain the difference between SQL and NoSQL databases.

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  • 53.

    What is data partitioning and its strategies?

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  • 54.

    Describe the concept of data indexing and its benefits.

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  • 55.

    What is data sharding and when is it used?

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  • 56.

    Explain the difference between vertical and horizontal scaling in databases.

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  • 57.

    What is data replication and its types?

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  • 58.

    Describe the role of caching in data retrieval.

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  • 59.

    What is a data lake and its architecture?

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  • 60.

    Explain the concept of data archiving and its importance.

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Data Governance and Security


  • 61.

    What is data governance and its key components?

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  • 62.

    Explain the difference between data governance and data management.

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  • 63.

    What are the common data governance frameworks?

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  • 64.

    Describe the role of data lineage in data governance.

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  • 65.

    What is data quality and its dimensions?

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  • 66.

    Explain the concept of data stewardship and its responsibilities.

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  • 67.

    What is data security and its best practices?

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  • 68.

    Describe the difference between authentication and authorization in data security.

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  • 69.

    What is data encryption and its types?

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  • 70.

    Explain the purpose of data auditing and its techniques.

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Data Monitoring and Optimization


  • 71.

    What is data monitoring and its importance?

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  • 72.

    Explain the difference between real-time and batch monitoring.

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  • 73.

    What are the common data monitoring tools and techniques?

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  • 74.

    Describe the role of data profiling in data monitoring.

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  • 75.

    What is data optimization and its strategies?

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  • 76.

    Explain the concept of data partitioning and its benefits in optimization.

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  • 77.

    What is query optimization and its techniques?

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  • 78.

    Describe the difference between data compression and data deduplication.

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  • 79.

    What is data caching and its use cases in optimization?

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  • 80.

    Explain the purpose of data archiving in data optimization.

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Data Engineering Tools and Frameworks


  • 81.

    What is Apache Spark and its key features?

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  • 82.

    Explain the difference between Spark RDDs and DataFrames.

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  • 83.

    What is Apache Airflow and its use cases?

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  • 84.

    Describe the role of Apache Kafka in data streaming.

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  • 85.

    What is Talend and its key components?

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  • 86.

    Explain the concept of data pipelines in Apache NiFi.

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  • 87.

    What is Informatica PowerCenter and its features?

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  • 88.

    Describe the difference between Hadoop and Apache Flink.

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  • 89.

    What is dbt (Data Build Tool) and its benefits?

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  • 90.

    Explain the purpose of Presto in data querying.

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Cloud Data Engineering


  • 91.

    What is cloud data engineering and its advantages?

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  • 92.

    Explain the difference between AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud Platform for data engineering.

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  • 93.

    What is Amazon S3 and its use cases in data storage?

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  • 94.

    Describe the role of Azure Data Factory in data integration.

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  • 95.

    What is Google BigQuery and its key features?

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  • 96.

    Explain the concept of serverless data processing in AWS Lambda.

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  • 97.

    What is Azure Databricks and its benefits?

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  • 98.

    Describe the difference between Amazon Redshift and Google BigQuery.

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  • 99.

    What is AWS Glue and its use cases in data integration?

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  • 100.

    Explain the purpose of Google Cloud Dataflow in data processing.

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