Practice · Quant prep · Optiver
Optiver interview questions
Optiver's process starts with online tests, taken before anyone from the firm speaks to you. The tests are about speed and accuracy under pressure; the interviews after them are about how you reason about odds and prices.
The process, from Optiver's own pages
- Applying. Applications go through the careers page only; Optiver says it cannot accept CVs by email. Source
- Online assessments. Sent after the application is reviewed. The job advertisement asks candidates to complete them within 7 days. Source
- One attempt. Assessments can be taken once every 8 months, and there are no retakes once an attempt has started, including after technical problems. Source
- Interviews. An initial behavioural interview with a recruiter, then a final-day interview. The FAQ recommends raising any competing deadlines with your recruiter. Source
- What they ask for. Exceptional quantitative and logical reasoning, an interest in strategic games or competitive activities, and Python as a plus. Source
What candidates report
Candidates consistently describe the arithmetic test as 80 multiple-choice questions in 8 minutes, a point gained for each right answer and lost for each wrong one, alongside other short tests of patterns and probability. The final day is reported to include a trading game in which you make markets on uncertain payoffs.
What Optiver is testing
The arithmetic test measures something narrower than mathematical ability: whether you can do six-second calculations reliably while a clock runs, and whether you can resist guessing when a wrong answer costs a point. Both are trainable, and the eight-month lockout means you should train before you apply rather than after.
The interviews then move to expected value and market making. You will be asked to put a number on something uncertain, commit to a bid and an offer, and then adjust when someone trades with you or when a new fact arrives. The questions below practise that sequence.
Six practice problems
Written by us to match the types Optiver is publicly reported to ask. None is a copy of a Optiver question.
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Without writing anything down: what is 49 × 51 + 1?
Show the answer
2500
49 × 51 = (50 − 1)(50 + 1) = 2500 − 1, so adding 1 gives exactly 2500. Spotting a difference of squares turns a two-digit product into one subtraction, which is the kind of shortcut the six-second test rewards.
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A contract pays the sum of three dice. You quote 9.5 bid, 11.5 offered, and someone buys from you at 11.5. Then one die is revealed to show a 6. What is the new fair value, and how is your position doing?
Show the answer
Fair value 13; you are down 1.5 per contract
Before the reveal the fair value is 3 × 3.5 = 10.5, so the sale at 11.5 looked like a profit of 1. With one die fixed at 6, the fair value becomes 6 + 2 × 3.5 = 13. You are short at 11.5 against 13: a loss of 1.5. The follow-up is always the same: where do you quote now? Around 12 at 14, centred on the new value.
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Two dice are rolled. What is the probability that the product of the two numbers is even?
Show the answer
3/4
The product is odd only when both dice are odd, which happens with probability 1/2 × 1/2 = 1/4. So an even product has probability 3/4. Going through the complement is quicker than counting the even cases.
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Roughly how many seconds are there in a year? Aim to be within 5%.
Show the answer
About 31.6 million
60 × 60 × 24 = 86,400 seconds a day, and 86,400 × 365 ≈ 31.5 million. A useful anchor: a year is close to π × 10⁷ seconds (31.4 million), within half a percent.
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You can pay £1.50 for a ticket that pays max(roll − 3, 0) pounds on one roll of a fair die. Do you buy it?
Show the answer
No: it is worth £1
The ticket pays 0, 0, 0, 1, 2 or 3, so it is worth (1 + 2 + 3)/6 = £1. At £1.50 you would lose 50p on average. This is a call option struck at 3 on a die, and pricing it is the same calculation as pricing any option: average the payoff over the outcomes.
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What is 7/8 − 3/5, as a decimal?
Show the answer
0.275
7/8 = 0.875 and 3/5 = 0.6, so the difference is 0.275. Knowing the eighths as decimals (0.125, 0.375, 0.625, 0.875) removes the need for a common denominator.
Practise under time
How to prepare for Optiver
Train the arithmetic until the 80 in 8 format feels routine, and only then apply: the seven-day window and the eight-month lockout leave no room to prepare afterwards. Learn the fraction–decimal table and the common products until you recall them rather than compute them. For the interviews, practise quoting markets out loud on dice and cards and saying why your quote moved.
Applying to Optiver this season? The assessment hour tells you whether your test scores and reasoning are at the level they screen for, before you use your one attempt. The assessment hour.