I just wrapped up a GitLab product designer interview for a role on their CI/CD experience team. Posting because I found almost zero recent UX interview write-ups for GitLab and had to go in mostly blind.
Process overview
Application -> recruiter screen -> portfolio review session -> design exercise -> values/culture interview -> hiring manager chat. Five stages over about 7 weeks.
Portfolio review (the most important part)
This was a 60-minute session with two designers. I had 30 minutes to walk through two case studies, then 30 minutes of questions.
What they cared about: The problem framing, not just the final screens. Why this problem, why now. How I involved real users. GitLab has a strong UX research culture and they'll probe whether your research was real or just 'we ran 3 usability tests.' Have the details. Complexity and tradeoffs. One of my case studies involved a dashboard redesign with conflicting stakeholder needs. They wanted to understand how I navigated that. Developer tools context. Because GitLab's users are largely developers, they asked how I think about designing for technical users differently from consumer products.
I'd strongly recommend having at least one case study that shows work in a B2B or developer-facing context. It doesn't have to be dev tools specifically but it helps.
Design exercise
Given a week in advance. The prompt was to redesign a specific piece of a developer workflow within GitLab (they gave me access to the app). I had to present it in the portfolio review session.
I went deep on the problem definition rather than trying to produce polished high-fidelity mockups. That was the right call. They explicitly said they value thinking over polish at this stage.
Values round
GitLab's CREDIT values come up here. Transparency and Iteration get asked about most in design interviews because they're culturally specific. Prepare a story about sharing design work early even when it's rough, and a story about changing direction based on data.
Async factor
GitLab runs async-first. In the design context, this means: can you communicate design rationale clearly in writing? They asked how I document decisions. Having a Notion or Confluence habit helps.
Offer was intermediate level, US remote, around $140k base. The team seemed genuinely thoughtful about the craft.