Dell and HPE Fresher Interview Process in India: HirePro Tests and Project-Heavy Rounds

For students whose placement cell has a Dell or HPE drive on the calendar. If it lands in the same week as a service-company test, multiple placement drives covers how to split your time.

TL;DR: I read four GeeksforGeeks candidate posts, three on Dell (2019 and two 2022 drives) and one on HPE (2022). Dell's online test was on HirePro in all three and had no coding questions in the posts I read. HPE's had two coding questions. All four then go to a project-heavy technical interview and a short managerial or HR round. Cut-offs and funnel sizes below belong to one college's drive each, not to a company rule. I found no official page describing either process, and no 2025-26 candidate post I could open.

Dell and HPE sit between the big IT-services batches I've covered, like Capgemini, Accenture and HCLTech, and the US-parent product centres like Cisco and Intuit or Oracle and PayPal. They hire far fewer people per college. The funnels in these posts end in 3, 12, 14 or 15 offers from a whole campus.

Dell: three posts, one HirePro test

The 2019 drive (software engineer, full time)

• About 1,300 students registered and 155 were shortlisted by the company for the test.
• The test ran on HirePro: 50 marks over 75 minutes, in three sections. Aptitude and reasoning (15 questions, 25 minutes), technical (25 questions, 45 minutes, covering DBMS, SQL, OS, networks and DSA) and a language section (10 questions, 15 minutes) where you picked Java, Python or C++. The author says there was no negative marking.
• About 44 students went to the technical interview, which ran 25 to 30 minutes and stayed close to the resume. Questions reported: OOP with examples, swapping two numbers without a third variable, the second largest number in O(N), an SQL join, TRUNCATE versus DELETE, and DML versus DDL.
• A separate hiring manager round (30 to 35 minutes) stuck to the author's prediction project and research paper. It also included designing a shortest-path application in 10 minutes without using a pre-existing algorithm.
• HR ran 15 to 20 minutes: strengths, weaknesses, "why should I hire you", location preference. Twelve students got offers over a two-day process.

The 2022 undergraduate internship drive (post updated October 2023)

• 74 students were eligible for the test. The post says 7.5 CGPA and 75% in 10th and 12th were required, and that meeting them still did not guarantee a place: some students with the cut-off were not selected. Internship experience or projects also mattered.
• The HirePro test was 75 minutes. Section one had 50 questions across aptitude, OS, DBMS, networks, software engineering and OOP. Section two, locked until section one was done, asked you to pick Java or C++ and then had find-the-output and find-the-error questions. The author's tip is to answer what you can quickly in section one and guess the rest, since you can't open section two otherwise. 45 students passed.
• Technical interviews were done by two senior Dell engineers and ran 1 to 1.5 hours. Students were split into 7 groups with different interviewers, so experiences differed. This author got deep project questions, a Django versus Flask question, a situational question about convincing a team to switch technology, one array question, one sliding window question and one aptitude question. Other groups got OOP, OS, DBMS, SQL, puzzles and internship questions.
• HR took about 25 minutes (what do you know about Dell and the role) and the author says everyone who reached it got an offer. 14 students did.

The 2022 SDE-1 solutions role, intern plus FTE (post updated July 2025)

• Eligibility in this post: 7.5 CGPA, no active backlogs, CS/IT only. About 600 students from the college sat the first round, which was resume shortlisting.
• Resume shortlisting cut the group to about 90. The author says CGPA was not the only filter: some students with 8.5 were not shortlisted while some with around 7.8 were. Projects and skills decided it.
• The online test on HirePro was 60 minutes, 50 MCQs: 10 aptitude and the rest core CS and language questions (DBMS, OS, networks, OOP, C++, Java, SQL, data structures). The author found it long because the questions were conceptual. About 12 students moved on.
• Technical interview 1 (45 minutes, Microsoft Teams, next day) started with two projects and cross-questions on motivation and tech stack. Then the OSI layers, abstraction versus data hiding, CPU scheduling, implementing encapsulation, and C++ questions because the author picked C++ (doubly linked list, interfaces, friend functions). Two coding questions: merging intervals (approach and function) and deleting the nth node from the end of a linked list (approach only). It ended with Git, Maven and Docker from the resume. About 5 students moved on.
• The managerial plus HR round (30 minutes) covered internships, Azure, hackathons and behavioural questions such as teamwork and conflict. Three students got intern plus FTE offers.

HPE: one post, the only one with coding in the test

A 2022 post says HPE visited on 9 September for two roles, Software Development/Software Automation and QA. The cut-offs were 80% in 10th and 12th and 7.0 CGPA, and 719 students were selected for the first round.

• Online test, four parts, all multiple choice except the last: 20 aptitude questions (probability, ratios, interest, profit and loss, time and work, ages, logical reasoning), 24 technical (OS, networks, Linux, IoT, cloud computing), 12 language MCQs where you chose C/C++ or Java/Python, and 2 coding questions. The coding language was tied to your part 3 choice, and the author could use only C or C++ because of it. The platform isn't named. 105 students moved on.
• Technical interview (1 hour 20 minutes): projects, then the author's preferred language (Python), exception handling, finding string length without library functions, f-string output questions, constructor call order under multiple inheritance in C++, minimum steps to cover points on an infinite grid, and squares of a sorted array in sorted order. The interviewer shared a whiteboard and online compiler link and asked for screen share. Friends were asked OS and networking basics, which this author wasn't.
• Managerial (35 minutes): no technical questions for this author. School life, why this college, family background, languages, what excites you about HPE. Friends reported OOP, networks, OS and DSA.
• HR (20 minutes): projects, family background, cities lived in, views on higher education and relocation, why HPE.
• 15 students were selected from that college: 4 interns and 11 for internship plus full time.

Where these posts disagree (and what that means)

• Does the test have coding? Dell's 2019 and 2022 tests had language MCQs only. HPE's had two coding questions. If your drive is Dell, don't assume a coding screen; if it's HPE, don't skip DSA.
• How big is the technical round? 25 to 30 minutes in 2019, 45 minutes in one 2022 post, up to 1.5 hours with two engineers in the other. The interviewer group matters more than the company.
• Cut-offs. 7.5 CGPA appears in both Dell 2022 posts, 7.0 in the HPE post, and no number in Dell 2019. All three posts that give one say it is only a threshold to apply.
• Role. Dell 2019 reads like a direct full-time hire, the two 2022 Dell drives and HPE are internship-then-FTE. Check the offer type in your drive mail before you plan a semester.

The newest Dell post I could open was updated in 2025 but describes a 2022 drive. Treat everything here as a pattern from a few colleges, not today's process.

What to do with this

1. Prepare core CS as MCQs, not just DSA. Both Dell tests were mostly OS, DBMS, networks, OOP and a Java/C++/Python section. Revise fundamentals fast and under a timer, since two authors call the test long.
2. Know every line of your resume. Resume shortlisting at Dell, deep project questions in two Dell rounds, a project-only hiring manager round in 2019, and tool questions (Git, Maven, Docker, Azure) in the SDE-1 post all came from what the students wrote.
3. Explain the approach before the code. The SDE-1 author says interviewers cared more about approach than output, and one coding question needed only the approach.
4. Pick your language knowing the follow-ups. Dell and HPE interviewers asked deeply about the language the candidate named, so name the one you can defend.
5. Prepare the soft rounds. Relocation, higher studies, family background, conflict in a team and "why Dell/HPE" all show up. They're short, but they're where some candidates were dropped in these funnels.
6. Check what your drive allows. HirePro tests are usually proctored. Read the rules in your invite. Where a tool is permitted for online assessments, OA Copilot supports HackerRank and CodeSignal style tests, and for live technical and HR interviews on video, AceRound's Interview Copilot gives you structured talking points as you answer. Whether either is allowed is up to your drive's rules, not us. For platform context see CoCubes and Goldman, JPMorgan, Walmart and SAP Labs.

FAQ

What is the Dell Technologies campus interview process for freshers in India?

Online test on HirePro, technical interview, then HR or managerial. The 2019 post adds a hiring manager round and one 2022 post adds resume shortlisting first.

Is there coding in the Dell online test?

Not in these posts. The test was multiple choice with a Java, C++ or Python section. Coding showed up in the interviews.

What is the Dell eligibility criteria for campus placement?

Two 2022 posts mention 7.5 CGPA, with 75% in 10th and 12th in one and no backlogs and CS/IT only in the other. Meeting it wasn't a guarantee.

What is in the HPE campus online test?

Aptitude, technical (OS, networks, Linux, IoT, cloud), language MCQs and two coding questions in one 2022 post.

Do Dell and HPE hire freshers as interns first?

In the 2022 posts, yes: six months of internship, then full time. The 2019 Dell post is a direct full-time drive.

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Author · Alex Chen. Career consultant and former tech recruiter. Spent 5 years on the hiring side before switching to help candidates instead. Writes about real interview dynamics, not textbook advice.