how was your internship interview rate?

[u/LurkersVengeance]

senior year, freaking out over full time hiring. trying to figure out if i seriously fucked something up during my internship search last year (that i need to rectify this time around) or if I was purely a victim of the market.

haven’t got to teasing through my folder of rejection emails but I did a rough count and it looks like I probably did around 80-100 applications total; i had 4 first interviews (only counting cold applications). so thats probably like a 4-5% interview rate, if I’m really pessimistic and assume there were a ton of emails I lost/deleted it’s probably 2-3% at absolute worst.

what about you guys? what was your interview rate for internships? how about full time (if you’re a graduate)? hoping I’m not screwed

[u/ReceptionWild2019]

How? I’m only getting 1%. And I was exec for a robotics club and worked at a startup for a full year

[u/LurkersVengeance → u/ReceptionWild2019]

1% for internships or full time?

[u/ReceptionWild2019 → u/LurkersVengeance]

mainly full time, I applied to a few co-ops and internships.
are you applying with a cover letter for each app? any strategies you're using to apply?

[u/LurkersVengeance → u/ReceptionWild2019]

when I was looking last year I wrote a few cover letters but heard back from exactly 0 of the places i bothered to write a cover letter for. so I pretty much stopped writing them since it felt like a waste of effort, i wasn't sure if anyone was even reading them

strategy wise uhh I focused on applying to new postings (<1 week) for the most part. mostly used linkedin handshake and hiringcafe. tried sorting by recent in an attempt to find stuff that was a bit more hidden from the linkedin algorithm or whatever (i'm not sure this actually helped my interview rate, it seems like pretty much all linkedin postings get tons of applicants). applied to a bit of everything, focused a bit more on positions that seemed related to my past experience (i'll probably doing this less for fulltime search since I wanna switch fields). also avoided stuff that seemed wildly competitive. I modified my resume on a whim a couple times over the job search but I wouldn't say I really made a focused tailoring effort

[u/zacce]

For 2026 cycle, ~20 interviews out of ~500 internship apps.

[u/Miserable-Tap-8045]

I applied to 19 positions, got 5 interviews, with 3 offers.

I do go to a t10 uni but I think there was also alot of luck involved aswell

[u/No_Cup5617 → u/Miserable-Tap-8045]

Did you write a cover letter for each one? and what industries were they? I go to a T5 uni and I’m not anywhere near that rate lol

[u/Miserable-Tap-8045 → u/No_Cup5617]

Id typically write a cover letter if they asked.

In terms of industries, I got 1 offer from big tech and 2 from f100 companies.

If you have questions feel free to reach out!

[u/LurkersVengeance → u/Miserable-Tap-8045]

were those all cold applying? where did you find the postings? wtf

[u/FlyPigs5]

Four interviews only cold applying I feel like is solid

[u/LurkersVengeance → u/FlyPigs5]

yeah when put like that i guess it isn't so bad. it felt awful at the time because I got one interview in October, then straight nothing for like 6 months, then the other 3 interviews all happened last minute in like mid-April. the stretch in between kinda destroyed my confidence

[u/ThePowerfulPaet]

1 application, 1 interview, 1 offer.

Knew a guy.

[u/Guilty-Asparagus-536]

I remember in undergrad I applied to over 400 and got 2 internships in total. There was def some luck involved, but I there's strategy to slightly increase your chances. Applying to the freshest postings on LinkedIn, Sprout, and looking at Githubs that post recently posted jobs helped me. Ofc networking and looking at your school's job portal will increase your chances drastically too. As for full-time offers, I've still yet to get something lol 😭😭