What to expect, what they’re really testing, and what a strong answer looks like — scored.
Community health, content moderation, creator tools, and the tension between free expression and platform safety. Reddit PMs must understand subreddit dynamics, the role of moderators as a volunteer labor force, and how algorithmic changes affect community culture.
The question below was asked by Reddit interviewers. The answer is graded on the five dimensions real PM interviewers use: structure, specificity, reasoning, decision quality, and delivery.
“How would you improve Reddit's onboarding for new users who don't know where to start?”
Reddit's onboarding problem is well-documented: the platform has enormous value but a steep learning curve. New users who don't know any subreddit names land on a generic feed that often surfaces niche content from communities they've never heard of, and they churn before discovering the communities that would have kept them.
I'd define onboarding success as: new user subscribes to at least 3 active subreddits within their first 7 days. Three communities is the minimum for a diverse enough feed to keep someone coming back.
The core problem: the current interest selection step during onboarding is too broad (categories like 'Sports' or 'Technology') and maps to too many subreddits. A new user who says they like 'Technology' gets r/technology (broad news) and r/MachineLearning (deep technical) and r/mildlyinteresting — very different communities.
Proposed improvement: replace broad category selection with 3 specific questions that map to subreddit affinity: 1. 'What's something you're an expert in or want to learn about?' → maps to specific knowledge subreddits 2. 'What do you do to unwind?' → maps to hobby, entertainment, and casual communities 3. 'What's a topic you follow in the news?' → maps to news and discussion communities
Each answer maps to 2-3 specific, curated subreddits (not the whole category). The user sees a preview of each subreddit's top posts before subscribing.
Success metric: subreddit subscription count at day 7 for new users who complete the revised onboarding vs. control group. Guardrail: don't reduce completion rate of the onboarding flow — if the new questions take longer, I'd set a max of 60 seconds for completion.
Defines success metric, diagnoses the root cause, proposes a specific replacement, and names guardrails.
Three specific question types, curated (not category) subreddits, 60-second completion guardrail — all concrete.
The 'broad categories map to too many different subreddits' diagnosis is correct and drives the specificity of the solution.
Commits to replacing the current flow rather than patching it; 3-subreddit threshold is a defensible minimum.
Well-paced; the three example questions are immediately clear.
The answer's strength is its specificity about what 'better onboarding' means for Reddit: not just 'more relevant content' but 'subscribed to 3 communities that match who you are.' The question-based approach over category selection is a genuine improvement hypothesis. The weakness: Reddit's community culture is partly about serendipitous discovery — over-curated onboarding might shortchange the experience of stumbling into a community you didn't know you'd love.
Add one sentence acknowledging the serendipity tradeoff and propose a way to preserve it — for example, including one 'wildcard' subreddit that's popular but outside the user's stated interests.
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