Karat

Name: Karat
Brand: Karat

Karat is a technical interviewing-as-a-service platform that delivers live human-led technical interviews, standardized scoring rubrics and recordings, and analytics used as an early screening signal.

Est 2014|Valuation $1.1B|Raised $168.8M|17 Ref Customers

LinkedIn 23K|Web traffic 19K|FTEs 348|HQ Seattle, Washington, US

MarketsInterviewing & Assessment

01Competitive Landscape

Narrative analysis

Where Karat tends to be selected - When the hiring bottleneck is engineering interviewer capacity, Karat supplies trained interviewers and an interview operating system (recordings, standardized scoring) rather than only a testing platform. - For global hiring and outside business-hours candidate scheduling, Karat provides on-demand coverage. Where competitors can be preferable - Cost and transparency: some assessment platforms publish entry pricing that may be lower for pilots or small teams. - Customization and role specificity: some vendors or service models allow more rapid customization for niche roles (this is a vendor claim and should be validated with customer references). - Retaining interviewing in-house: organizations that prefer to keep interviewing internal and have interviewer bandwidth may prefer assessment platforms rather than an external interviewing service. Market trend pressure (AI-assisted cheating) Media coverage and industry reporting indicate that AI-assisted cheating is a growing concern for technical interviews. This trend affects all providers in the category and increases the need for updated controls, interview design changes, and verification processes.

	Karat	HackerRank	CodeSignal
Starting Price	Not publicly listed; contract-based (third-party median annual benchmarking exists)	Published entry pricing available for basic tiers	Not publicly listed (quote-based)
Best For	Organizations needing live human-led standardized interviews and additional interviewer capacity	Teams seeking coding tests with published entry pricing and interview tooling	Organizations seeking a broad assessment suite with bundled assessment and interviewing tools
Key Strength	Provides trained interviewers and interview operations (recordings, standardized scoring) to reduce internal engineering interviewer load	Low-cost entry points and a large question bank; screening plus interview tooling	Strong assessment capabilities and bundled hiring metrics; enterprise sales motion
Key Weakness	Candidate experience risk; potential role coverage gaps; opaque pricing	More DIY approach requiring internal management of interviews; candidate frustration with test formats	Pricing opacity and may require additional services for interview-as-a-service functionality

01Competitive Landscape

Narrative analysis

Where Karat tends to be selected

When the hiring bottleneck is engineering interviewer capacity, Karat supplies trained interviewers and an interview operating system (recordings, standardized scoring) rather than only a testing platform.
For global hiring and outside business-hours candidate scheduling, Karat provides on-demand coverage.

Where competitors can be preferable

Cost and transparency: some assessment platforms publish entry pricing that may be lower for pilots or small teams.
Customization and role specificity: some vendors or service models allow more rapid customization for niche roles (this is a vendor claim and should be validated with customer references).
Retaining interviewing in-house: organizations that prefer to keep interviewing internal and have interviewer bandwidth may prefer assessment platforms rather than an external interviewing service.

Market trend pressure (AI-assisted cheating) Media coverage and industry reporting indicate that AI-assisted cheating is a growing concern for technical interviews. This trend affects all providers in the category and increases the need for updated controls, interview design changes, and verification processes.

	Karat	HackerRank	CodeSignal
Starting Price	Not publicly listed; contract-based (third-party median annual benchmarking exists)	Published entry pricing available for basic tiers	Not publicly listed (quote-based)
Best For	Organizations needing live human-led standardized interviews and additional interviewer capacity	Teams seeking coding tests with published entry pricing and interview tooling	Organizations seeking a broad assessment suite with bundled assessment and interviewing tools
Key Strength	Provides trained interviewers and interview operations (recordings, standardized scoring) to reduce internal engineering interviewer load	Low-cost entry points and a large question bank; screening plus interview tooling	Strong assessment capabilities and bundled hiring metrics; enterprise sales motion
Key Weakness	Candidate experience risk; potential role coverage gaps; opaque pricing	More DIY approach requiring internal management of interviews; candidate frustration with test formats	Pricing opacity and may require additional services for interview-as-a-service functionality