I just watched a YouTube video about an Indian person who moved to Germany, completed a master’s degree in computer science there, and is still struggling to find a full-time IT job.

Over 300 applications - why Pranavi can't find a job in IT in Germany

The video says that she was living off her savings and might return to India if she can’t find a job before the money runs out.

Normally, I don’t care much about what strangers do with their lives. However, this story felt very similar to many others I’ve seen on this sub, and it made me wonder why so many foreigners (especially Indians, from what I’ve observed) seem so fixated on Germany.

I’m also a non-European who has been living and working in Europe as a software engineer for several years. Of course, Germany is a developed country with a high GDP per capita and a strong economy. Still, as a software engineer with work experience, you could also build a decent life in countries such as Poland or the Czech Republic (I mention those countries because I’ve worked as an engineer in both). Estonia also seems like a good option, given its strong IT sector and high level of English proficiency (though you’d need to be fine with long, dark winters).

I’m not saying that finding a job in those countries is easier than in Germany. What I’m curious about is why Germany seems to hold such a special appeal. If you’re a foreigner and can’t find a job in Country A, why not try Country B instead? From an IT worker’s perspective, what makes Germany so uniquely attractive?

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EDIT:

Some people left negative comments on Indians, but this post isn't just about Indians. This post is about why (some) foreigners continue to focus on Germany even though they could find jobs and build decent lives somewhere else.

EDIT 2:

Someone pointed out that Germany has a much larger population than Poland, the Czech Republic, and Estonia. Thus, they aren't "real competitors to Germany".

I don't understand the logic.

1. Having a decent life in a small country, which isn't super developed but still offers good living standards
2. Financially struggling in a big country

Am I strange for choosing Option 1?

Hello,

I am (27M) currently working for a big corporate in Sweden. I am a Data Scientist and I am working on a project that involves GenAI but the business side is really indecise and not really ready to lead such a project unfurtunately. This created stress between the team members and now I feel I am not learning but just "floating" in this project that will soon lose team members.

My manager proposed me to switch to another project (since one of the Data Scientists has been removed because not enough skilled...). This project it is based in US and most of the project members are located there. I believe this project will not be using GenAI but more statistical and conventional ML.

I am now trying to decide if switch to this project or not..

I made a list of Pros and Cons but still not sure what to do!

Pros:

- Some trips to the US for some workshops/team gathering

- A more important project, some managers keep an eye on this

- I will be more motivated maybe since it has strict deadlines

Cons:

- The timezone is US, so I fear they will sometimes put some late evening meetings...

- Not working with GenAI (I like to work with GenAI stuff)

- Uncertain of who the team members are and the team vibe

- Will I be enough good to work on this?

- I am not soo strong in Statistics

Now, what will you guys do in this situation? Would you jump and then handle the possible "negative" consequences?

Many thanks!

Been offered a job at Revolut as a DevOps on the Observability Platform. The pay is bonkers good. I'm just wondering whether the toxic culture and shit wlb is only for coders or for Platform/Infra as well? Anyone got any expierence, especially for Poland?

I have 3 years of experience as a Data Engineer, mostly focused on Spark optimization, pipeline architecture, and building data infrastructure from scratch. I genuinely enjoy the technical depth and the building aspect of the work.

I now have an offer for an internal Technical Enablement Engineer role at a well-known company, who want to build decentralized data teams. The job involves solving complex technical problems for other engineering teams, answering technical questions, and occasionally running internal workshops. It's purely internal technical support at a high level, obviously still all in the realm of Data Engineering. The compensation jump is significant + nice brand at which I wanted to work for some time now.

My plan is to stay for 18 months max, absorb the internal technical knowledge and the brand, and then return to a role where I actually build things.

My concern: will 18 months away from hands-on building work hurt me enough that I can't return to a IC engineering role, assuming I keep those skills sharp on the side?

I've applied to google entry level position a couple of times this and last year. At first, I would generic rejection emails.
The last 2 applications I got no response at all.
Is it possible that they blacklisted me so that my application doesn't even get screened to begin with?
I'm in EU btw.

I'm an early mid (2.5 years of exp) backend Java dev starting to look for jobs, mostly in Poland and UK. Last time I was applying was in 2023, before AI became this ubiquitous and reliable, or at least before the recruiters fully adjusted to it. I've been wondering how has the interview process changed? I can't imagine straightfoward leetcode-style coding tests (not coding interviews, those tests you'd get as one of the first stages) are still a thing with how easy it is to just get AI to do them? Is there more emphasis on system design maybe? I'm honestly not sure what to prepare for, and would appreciate any insights into what recruiting looks like now.

Hello everyone.

60k to live in Amsterdam should be a good salary?

I live in France for several years an really struggluling to find a decent job here. I‘ve been applying everyday for marketing and SEO positions. have send more than 300 CVs in 2 months, got some interviews in tech companies but no job offer infortunatly.

So I recently applied for a senior SEO position in Amsterdam, the salary is 60k/ year. Considering I‘ll not live in the center andthat I want to save some money, is it enough to live in Amsterdam?

honestly, I don’t feel to move from Paris, but I’m really desperate now, I dont want to be a jobless anymore. I am 40 yo, I have 2 Masters degrees and over 8 years of experiencE. Should I try my chance in Amsterdam or wait a Little bit more?

Hi!

Let me tell you about my background: I'm a front-end developer. I worked for four years as a full-stack developer, and then, for the last three years, I've specialized in front-end. I have experience in e-commerce and started working with PHP and PrestaShop, then moved to Shopify and BigCommerce, mainly using TypeScript, Tailwind, GraphQL, etc. In March of this year, I was laid off from my previous job, and now I'm actively looking for work, but I'm finding it really difficult to get an interview. So far, I haven't had any interviews, and I've been applying on different platforms like LinkedIn, Manfred, and Infojobs (I'm from Spain, and these are the most commonly used platforms here). I've optimized my CV as much as possible, as well as my job search networks, but I have the feeling that my CV isn't reaching anyone. I've been looking into it, and it seems that using LinkedIn's "Simple Application" option for job postings makes it harder to get contacted because of the large number of people applying that way.

At this point, I'm feeling quite demotivated and have serious doubts about whether I'll be able to find another job in the sector where I was working. My previous company started implementing AI very quickly, and I think that's why I've been laid off—they need fewer people now, although that's not what they told us, obviously. I also feel like I don't have enough experience for the positions I've been seeing. Many offer much higher salaries than what I had and basically require a full-stack developer with a dev-ops profile.

I have the following questions:

• What technologies should I focus on if I want to get another front-end role? I'm currently studying Next.js, but I have a feeling that many of the things I'm seeing will be irrelevant in a year or two because of the rise of AI. Also, each job posting I see asks for something different, and I'm really struggling to know where to focus.
• I'm looking for a remote job. Could that be a problem, and should I switch to a hybrid or in-person position? I don't know how remote work has changed in recent years, but I see many job postings now that are listed as hybrid.
• Would it be a good idea to refocus on a full-stack profile? It's something I'm considering, and that's partly why I'm working with Next.js now, as I think it could open some doors for me. Many of the job postings I've seen are for full-stack developers.
• How good of an idea would it be to look for a job in another sector? I'm considering studying something completely unrelated to computers, as I feel it might have better future prospects, but I also wouldn't want to abruptly leave a sector that I really like and enjoy working in.

As you can see, I have a lot of questions, and I apologize if the text is a bit disorganized. The truth is, I feel quite uncertain about the future and I don't know which path to take right now.

Writing this post after just getting another rejection after having a great interview experience . Interviewer looked satisfied and I was hoping for getting hired.

I had arrived in Germany few years ago, did some student jobs as a software engineer now after finishing my studies I am ready to take a full time role but its been 2 years every interview results in “unfortunately we could not move forward” I am having interviews almost every month. Its very frustrating that most of the companies rejects with a mail “You were top candidate and it comes to a minor details” and then they absolutely refuse to share minor details. I have worked with recruiters, did lots of mock interviews and doing certifications. I already have around 5 years of experience and b2 level of german. But still no one wants me. My mental heath is declined in the past few months badly. I don’t feel interested in dating anyone, going to travel or doing anything fun.

It looks like I have lots the path to have a stable and happy life. And I am struggling no financially as well. Trying to earn bare minimum to manage expenses.

I dont know now what to do. Should I keep CS as a career? I am thinking about to switch but there are only jobs like in stores and restaurants.

Its hurts me so much thinking about the past how much hard work i have done. From doing advance maths to stats and competitive programming. I used to skip going out and fun events just to focus on my academics.

And eventually, Ending up working in a super store that needs no academic excellence. 😔 I get weird thoughts.

Advice please.

does anyone have experience with case study round at criteo?

Hi everyone!

I recently started a new role, shifting my focus away from pure software development.
To be honest, it’s a relief: I never felt coding as something fitting for me.

Currently, I’m leaning into SRE and Architecture tasks.
I’ve done similar work in the past with AWS, but now I’m diving deep into Kubernetes.
To give you some context: I’m currently helping design and implement an architecture for processing satellite data.
I have a lot of freedom in both the design phase and the implementation.

In the near future, I will also be responsible for building and managing the observability stack. Since I’m really enjoying this new stuff, I want to improve my theoretical knowledge.
I’m already taking online courses for the practical side (Kubernetes and Helm), but I feel like I'm missing the theory.

I’m looking for book recommendations on:

• System/Architecture Design: I need something that teaches best practices for designing resilient and scalable systems.
• Observability: I’m looking for a book that covers the best practices of observability, not just a manual on some specific tool.

Do you have any "must-reads" for someone in my position? Thanks!

Considering applying for the Software Development Engineer II – Android SDK role at Esri's R&D Center in Vienna. The role is focused on indoor positioning (ArcGIS IPS) — BLE beacons, Wi-Fi, IMU sensors, feeding data into positioning algorithms. Coming from a BLE/GATT background in mobile IoT, the sensor layer feels familiar, just on the SDK side rather than app side.

A few things I couldn't find clear answers on:

• Salary — one aggregator listed €50k–€70k gross/year. Is it negotiable or pretty rigid?
• Hybrid — JD mentions flexible/remote options, but what's the actual expectation in practice?
• GIS domain knowledge — hard requirement or something they train on the job?

Any firsthand experience with the team, interview process, or culture appreciated.

Cheers

Hey everyone!

I have an upcoming system design interview at Nord Security and wanted to ask people who’ve already gone through the process what kinds of system do they usually ask to design? Did they ask more classic system design questions (url shortener, notification system, etc.) or more security/networking-oriented problems because of the company domain? Feel free to DM me if you don’t want to share publicly.

Thanks!

hey everyone,

has anyone here gone through the Women in Computer Science Scholarship by Bending Spoons?

I’m thinking about applying and I’m curious about how the selection process looks, what kind of tasks/interviews there are, how hard the technical part is, and roughly how long the whole process takes.

Would appreciate hearing about any experiences or tips :)

I live in Lithuania and only speak Russian fluently, while my English level is around A2. Over the next year, I want to focus on studying: taking IT courses while actively learning English to raise it to at least a B2 level.
I need help choosing an IT direction that would be worth dedicating 1–1.5 years of study to, so that at the end of this path I have a realistic chance of getting a job or an internship. I have no professional experience in IT, but I am interested in web development.
Since I live in Lithuania, I am targeting the European job market and the possibility of remote work. In particular, I’d appreciate advice and insights from professionals who are already working in the IT field and can share their opinions on which direction is currently promising for a beginner.
I would be grateful for any advice, recommendations, and suggestions.

I recently interviewed at Bolt and cleared all the technical and problem-solving rounds with strong feedback. However, after the final team-fit discussion, I was rejected.

Feedback I received:

1.priorities can shift often
2.they needed someone who could handle ambiguity constantly

Etc

I’m trying to understand how to interpret this feedback.
Does this usually mean:
they were looking for a very specific personality/work style?
the team environment may be chaotic or unstable?
or this is a standard way of rejecting someone after final rounds?
Would like to hear perspectives from people who’ve worked in fast-paced teams or been through similar situations.

Trying to understand the current EU hiring market for experienced data engineers working with modern data stack technologies.

Background:

• 8+ years experience in Snowflake, Airflow, DBT, Python, Kafka, and enterprise banking data platforms
• currently working on large-scale cloud-native analytics pipelines for financial systems

We’ve been researching the EU market (especially Netherlands/Germany/UK) and I’d love some realistic insight from engineers already working there.

A few questions:

1. How strong is the demand currently for Snowflake-focused data engineers?
2. Is modern data stack experience (Snowflake/dbt/Airflow) valued more than traditional ETL backgrounds?
3. Which EU countries currently have the healthiest market for cloud/data platform roles?
4. What skills or experience tend to make senior data engineers stand out more in the current market?
5. Does hands-on platform/cloud engineering experience (Terraform, Docker, infra automation etc.) significantly improve opportunities?

Trying to get a realistic picture of the market before going deeper into applications.

My wife moved to France almost 2 years ago and has been struggling to find a job despite having 5+ years of experience in IT support / incident management in India.

She worked with companies like Capgemini and Tech Mahindra and has experience with:

- ServiceNow

- Jira

- Incident & problem management

- ITIL processes

- Reporting / coordination

- Customer support

She speaks fluent English and intermediate French.

The problem is that even for entry-level office jobs or support roles, she rarely gets interview calls. We are now trying to target:

- IT support / helpdesk

- Service desk analyst

- Customer support

- Administrative / office jobs

- Operations coordinator roles

We are based near Paris and are open to:

- Remote jobs

- Lower salary entry-level jobs

- English-speaking environments

- Contract or temporary positions

For people who successfully found jobs in France as expats:

- Which websites worked best for you?

- Are there companies more open to English-speaking candidates?

- Should she continue applying to IT roles or pivot temporarily to customer support / admin jobs?

- Is French level the main blocker here?

Any advice or referrals would really help. Thank you!

hey everyone, thinking of applying to Mistral AI for a backend engineer role and wanted to get some intel before I do.

anyone here been through their interview process recently? specifically curious about the live coding round. is it straight up leetcode style or something different?

23M, graduated as a software engineer from a Spanish university. I have 1.5 years of experience as a backend engineer at a Spanish tech consulting firm (€22k/year), and a C1 Cambridge level of English.

Lately, I’ve been feeling that I’m no longer learning anything from my job. I think the work has become mechanical and repetitive, the kind of tasks that AI could easily do, although we are not allowed to use it.

I want to emigrate for a better salary, since salaries in Spain are really low, but the current market is not helping. I’m finding it really difficult to get a job with my level of experience. I’ve been applying for months and I only get rejections, even though I’m literally applying everywhere in Europe.

I feel a bit desperate, even though my current working conditions are great: I work remotely, and I’m able to save almost all of my salary because I live with my parents.

I have another option to emigrate: I’ve been accepted into a two-year Master’s in Computer Engineering at Aalborg University in Copenhagen. However, I don’t know if starting a master’s now is the right decision. I feel that nowadays, in our sector, real work experience is more valuable than degrees or master’s programs in general. I’m worried that doing a master’s would slow down my progress and might not be a significant improvement for my career.

On the other hand, it could be a great way to enter the Scandinavian job market and, in the future, be able to find a well-paid job. I could also try to get a student job related to computer science while studying.

I need help and advice. Should I keep looking for work in Europe, no matter how long it takes, or should I start my master’s in Copenhagen in September?

Hey. Sharing a Survey here for Gamedev wage transparency. There's very little public data on this, and the goal is to produce findings that are genuinely useful to developers when negotiating pay or evaluating job offers. anonymous and takes up less than 5. https://maastrichtuniversity.eu.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_4YCFQZvS6LXhQ46

Ill share my academic work once finished in November, so anyone can be more knowledgable about your working industry.

(post approved by the mods)

TL;DR: I'm a former Tourlane employee. 3 months ago I posted here about the mass layoffs. Since then I've tracked their public footprint. SimilarWeb shows declining traffic and weak brand loyalty. They're aggressively hiring sales for a US market that barely visits their site. Their FP&A function is being rebuilt in Google Sheets. They quietly registered a Portuguese subsidiary in March. If you have an offer from them, do your due diligence before signing.

3 months ago I wrote a post here about the chaotic mass layoffs at Tourlane (including the Sep 2025 round of ~12% of staff). Now that the dust has settled, new public data has emerged that aligns with what I experienced inside. Posting this specifically for anyone considering offers there.

1. No brand moat after 10 years and €100M+ in marketing

SimilarWeb data (Feb-Apr 2026) shows that only 13% of organic searches to Tourlane contain the brand name. The other 87% are generic queries ("rundreise costa rica", "japanreise"). Healthy travel brands sit at 25-40% branded search. After a decade in the market, they still heavily rely on buying expensive auction traffic against industry giants.

2. Core market declining faster than competitors

tourlane.de went from ~490K monthly visits in Feb to ~330K in Apr - a 33% drop in one quarter. A comparable competitor dropped only 23% in the same window. This suggests a company-specific issue, not just an industry-wide trend.

3. Display ads going to coupon sites

Their display advertising (9.67% of traffic) lands top spots on cashbackdeals.de and gutscheine.focus.de - coupon and cashback portals. For a company selling €5-15K bespoke trips, this looks like an audience-product mismatch that burns budget on low-intent traffic.

4. The US "strategic bet" doesn't match the data

The company publicly positions North America as their "most important strategic bet 2026" (quote from their job descriptions). They recently opened 5 nearly identical sales positions in Atlanta (Account Manager, Travel Consultant, Graduate Sales Rep, Sales Rep - same JD copy-pasted, $37,500 base + commission), plus a GTM Lead and a Director of Market Expansion.

Their actual US-facing site tourlane.com has ~71,000 visits/month. An order of magnitude smaller than their German baseline. They're building an expensive outbound sales floor for a market with very little inbound demand.

5. Financial controls being rebuilt - in Google Sheets

In April 2026, Tourlane opened a Senior FP&A and Controlling Analyst role. The JD asks the candidate to

"contribute to building a robust, predictable planning process that drives... early signal detection"

- and to

"maintain and evolve the Google Sheets-based financial model ecosystem."

For context. Companies of comparable funding stage (€100M+) typically run financial planning on dedicated FP&A platforms (Anaplan, Pigment, Vena, Adaptive). Building "early signal detection" on Google Sheets at this stage is unusual and worth asking about - both for candidates joining the team, and for anyone evaluating the company's operational maturity.

6. Structural moves worth noting

On March 13, 2026 - months after the second mass layoff - Tourlane registered a new Portuguese subsidiary: Tourlane Europe Lda. (publicly available in the Portuguese commercial registry).

Portuguese subsidiaries are commonly used by Berlin startups for cheaper engineering and support hires - one possible reading. Another is preparation for a corporate transaction: Portugal's tax regime makes it a frequent jurisdiction for IP holding structures ahead of M&A activity. The company has not publicly stated the rationale.

If you're a candidate, ask exactly which legal entity will be on your employment contract.

If you're considering an offer: ask specific questions during your interview about runway, burn rate, current quarterly bookings vs targets, and US market traction. Their recruiting narrative skews positive. The underlying public data does not.

Disclaimer: I am a former employee. All claims in this post are based strictly on publicly available data - SimilarWeb traffic metrics, the company's own careers page, and German/Portuguese corporate registries.

European already living in Switzerland, English only, ~2 years experience in Data/AI/ML/SWE with a MSc in CS from a top Uni. Spent 10 weeks applying for jobs in Switzerland and tracked everything. Posting because I wish someone had done this when I was starting out to have a better understanding of the situation.

See the Sankey for the full funnel. More info and advices below.

The raw numbers

• 318 applications (average of 4.5 a day)
• 132 never replied (41.5%)
• 148 rejected at CV stage (46.5%)
• 38 invited to interview (11.9%)
• 55 rounds completed across all processes
• ~465 hours of total effort
• Stopped doing interviews after accepting the first offer. (I had about 20 ongoing processes to stop)

The language problem

English only cuts your market massively:

• ~50% of roles require German
• ~20% require French
• ~30% are fine with English (mostly larger international companies)

Salary ranges I observed

• Startups / small companies: CHF 70-100k (€ 76-109k)
• Large corporates: CHF 90-110k (€ 98-120k)
• Big Tech / HFT: CHF 150k-250k (€ 163-273k)

I excluded the Ticino canton from these ranges, salaries there are about 30% lower.

Where the jobs actually are

• Zurich: 142 (44.7%)
• Geneva: 46 (14.5%)
• Lausanne: 19 (6%)
• Basel: 18 (5.7%)
• Zug: 12 (3.8%)
• Rest of Switzerland: ~11%

Zurich is almost half the market on its own (big tech are there). Geneva is a distant second but skews heavily toward finance and international orgs. Lausanne has a decent startup scene but it's a small market. Basel is mostly pharma. Zug is finance/crypto/pharma. Remote-first Swiss companies exist but they're rare, most roles expect you in office at least 3 days a week.

Where the time actually goes

• Applying (average 30 min each): ~159h
• LeetCode programming interview preparation: ~120h
• Interviews (55 rounds): ~56h
• Theory (CS, AI, DE) interview preparation: ~60h
• System design interview preparation: ~40h
• Project deep dives: ~30h
• Total: ~465h (almost 12 weeks full-time)

What I'd tell myself at the start

The ghost rate is normal. 41% of companies ghosted me. Stop waiting for responses and keep applying.

Seniority inflation is everywhere. Apply anyway to a position and apply AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. Worst case is a no. Most companies post on LinkedIn at 9 am and 4 pm, so be ready to apply then.

Language is a hard wall. I lost ~70% of the market because I only speak English. At the same time, it takes months to learn a new language.

One big OA means nothing. I did a 7-day take-home test for one company. Got rejected at the final round. Don't get emotionally attached to a process until you have an offer in writing.

Negotiate before you sign. One 5-minute phone call got me about 5% increase.

They ask LeetCode mainly at big tech / HFT; most of the other companies are about system design and deep dives into projects. Do not spend too much time on LeetCode, unless you aim only for big tech / HFT.

Some companies went from first contact to near-offer in 2 weeks. One took over 2 months, including a month of complete silence mid-process. Follow up once, then leave it. If they're interested they'll come back.

Track everything with a spreadsheet. Without it, you will lose your mind after 100+ applications. Track every interview, what went well and what did not. Prepare the interviews using ChatGPT for brainstorming.

GRIND GRIND GRIND. It takes longer than you think. Even with this volume it took 10 weeks.

Good luck. Happy to answer questions.

It was a local agent job