The Best Platforms for Take-Home Coding Projects in 2020
[🚨🚨🚨 Updated: The 5 best code assessment platforms for screening software developers in 2023]
Coding assessment platforms have enabled companies to hire top developer talent much more efficiently while mitigating bias throughout the recruiting process. Virtually all talent acquisition teams today deploy code assessments or interviews to evaluate candidates in their pipelines.
More recently, companies have begun leveraging take-home assignments at later stages of the interview process to let candidates more seamlessly demonstrate real-world skills. Coding projects offer far more robust and insightful assessments of candidates than rushed in-person or virtual whiteboarding or challenge-based assessments. Some platforms even come with a library of interesting and configurable assignments and then let candidates build on a GitHub repository on their own time.
Beyond platforms for take-home coding projects, check out our other reviews:
Top code assessment platforms →
Top code interviewing platforms →
1. Coderbyte
Helpful links: Website | G2 | Capterra | Pricing
With Coderbyte’s Projects capability, you can offer your top candidates take-home projects to generate deeper insight as a final step in the interview process. Coderbyte has a proprietary library of real-world assignments that you can view, run, and analyze directly online.
Pros
- It’s cost-effective: Coderbyte is the only platform that offers unlimited admins (recruiters/hiring managers), assessments, and candidates on any subscription plan. Subscriptions begin at $199/month.
- Coderbyte has two types of take-home projects: (i) projects that candidates do in their own IDE and upload after, and (ii) projects that candidates do within Coderbyte’s IDE which are recorded by Session Rewind.
- With Coderbyte, you can even compensate candidates who work on longer projects to increase completion rates and maintain a positive candidate experience.
Cons
- Coderbyte’s library of take-home projects is limited so you may need to use or create your own custom project.
Recommended for
- Tech-forward organizations that care deeply about the candidate experience and are comfortable operating a self-service tool.
2. HackerRank
Helpful links: Website | G2 | Capterra | Pricing
With HackerRank’s Projects capability, you can access a deep library of projects for front-end, back-end, data science, and DevOps roles. HackerRank also offers a Docker container backed, developer-friendly environment with support for multiple files, debugging, autocomplete, linting, git integration, and more, to complete projects within the browser.
Pros
- Robust project library that encompasses the most common roles
- The ability for candidates to code in HackerRank’s online IDE or at-home
- HackerRank also offers screening and interviewing so you can do all your assessments within a single, enterprise-grade platform.
Cons
- As always, the issue with HackerRank is the substantial investment and sometimes confusing experience for candidates
Recommended for
- Large corporations that require enterprise features like SSO, GDPR compliance, and advanced privacy features.
3. Devskiller
Helpful links: Website | G2 | Capterra | Pricing
While not truly built for take-home projects, Devskiller lets candidates create and connect to online repositories to build apps. Savvy engineering leaders and talent acquisition teams can create projects with frameworks, libraries, and external sources to imitate their company’s programming environment and assess how candidates code more realistically.
Pros
- The ability for candidates to code in Devskiller’s online IDE or at-home.
- Devskiller also offers screening and interviewing so you can do all your assessments within a single platform.
Cons
- Devskiller’s user experience leaves a lot to be desired for both recruiters and candidates.
- Devskiller’s pricing constantly changes and has strange limitations.
- There isn’t a built-in library of projects so you have to create your own.
Recommended for
- Devskiller is for highly technical talent acquisition teams that need advanced customization and control.
Manually managing take-home projects
It’s very common for companies to create their own take-home assignments and then manage the workflow of sending it to candidates, receiving their submissions, and grading it. That works well for when a company has very few candidates, but at some point it becomes difficult managing all submission over email and a spreadsheet, so a platform solution can help streamline the entire process.
By using Coderbyte for example, you can have all your candidates and their information in one dashboard, along with being able to view their solutions on GitHub or run their entire projects directly online.
