Practice English for a job interview

The hardest part of an interview in a second language is not the answers you prepared — it is speaking them under pressure, out loud, without freezing. Reading tips does not fix that. Speaking does.

Airi is a voice AI you can rehearse with as many times as you like. She plays the interviewer, asks common questions like "Tell me about yourself" and "Why do you want this role?", listens to your spoken answer, and replies in a natural voice. When you make a small mistake she shows a quick fix and keeps the conversation moving, so you build fluency instead of stopping at every error.

A quick example with Airi

Let's begin. Tell me a little about yourself and your experience.

I working as a designer since three years in a startup.

Small fix: "I have been working as a designer for three years." Nice background! What kind of design do you focus on?

Mostly product design, mobile apps.

Great. Can you tell me about a project you are proud of?

Try a conversation like this, free600 free credits, about 8 minutes of speaking. No card.

The questions you are most likely to be asked

Interviews in English follow a pattern. Most of them open with one broad question, move to your experience, test how you behave under pressure, and close by asking what you want to know. If you can answer the eight questions below out loud without stopping to translate, you are ready for most first interviews.

Question	What they are really asking	A strong answer starts with
Tell me about yourself.	Can you summarise your career in a minute?	I'm a ... with ... years of experience in ...
Why do you want this role?	Did you read the job description?	What drew me to this role is ...
What are your strengths?	What can you do that we need?	I'd say my main strength is ..., for example ...
What is your biggest weakness?	Are you honest, and do you improve?	One thing I've been working on is ...
Tell me about a time you solved a problem.	How do you act when things go wrong?	In my last role, we had a situation where ...
Why are you leaving your current job?	Will you speak badly of us too?	I've learned a lot there, and I'm now looking for ...
Where do you see yourself in five years?	Will you stay and grow?	I'd like to have grown into ...
Do you have any questions for us?	Are you genuinely interested?	Yes. Could you tell me more about ...

How to structure an answer: the STAR method

For any question that begins "Tell me about a time when ...", interviewers expect a short story with a clear result. The STAR method keeps that story in order, which matters even more when you are speaking a second language: you always know what comes next.

Situation. One sentence of context. "Last year our team lost two developers a month before a launch."
Task. What you were responsible for. "I was asked to keep the release date."
Action. What you did, using "I", not "we". "I cut the scope to the three features customers used most and reorganised the testing."
Result. What happened, with a number if you have one. "We launched on time, and support tickets fell by about a third."

Aim for about a minute per story. Prepare three stories before the interview: a problem you solved, a conflict you handled, and a result you are proud of. Those three cover most behavioural questions.

Phrases that make you sound prepared

When you need to	Say
Buy a few seconds to think	That's a good question. Let me think about that for a moment.
Ask them to repeat	Sorry, could you say that again, please?
Check you understood	Just to make sure I understand: are you asking about ...?
Give an example	A good example of that is when I ...
Admit you don't know	I haven't worked with that directly, but I have done something similar: ...
Talk about salary	Based on my experience and the market, I'm looking for something in the range of ...
Close the interview	Thank you for your time. I'm very interested in the role, and I look forward to hearing from you.

Asking an interviewer to repeat a question is normal and never counts against you. Guessing what they asked and answering the wrong question does.

Mistakes English learners make in interviews

Instead of	Say	Why
I am working here since 2021.	I have been working here since 2021.	Something that started in the past and continues needs the present perfect.
I am responsible to manage the team.	I am responsible for managing the team.	"Responsible" takes "for" and a verb ending in -ing.
I have five years experiences.	I have five years of experience.	"Experience" as work history has no plural.
I am agree with you.	I agree with you.	"Agree" is a verb, so it needs no "am".
My weakness is I am perfectionist.	I sometimes spend too long on details, so now I set a time limit for each task.	A real weakness with what you are doing about it is more convincing.

A ten-minute rehearsal with Airi

Reading questions is preparation. Answering them out loud is practice. This routine takes about ten minutes, and your free credits are enough for a first run through several questions. It is worth repeating the day before your interview.

Tell Airi the role: "Be a hiring manager interviewing me for a marketing coordinator job. Ask one question at a time."
Answer "Tell me about yourself" in under a minute. If you run long, try again and cut the details.
Ask for one behavioural question and answer it with STAR.
When she shows a small fix, repeat the corrected sentence out loud once before you continue.
Finish by asking her two questions about the company, as you would in the real interview.
Run the whole thing a second time. The second attempt is where the words start to come without translating.

How to get the most from it

Rehearse the opening

The first 30 seconds set the tone. Practice "Tell me about yourself" until it feels natural, not memorised.

Answer, then stop

Give a clear answer and pause. Airi will ask a follow-up, just like a real interviewer, so you learn to hold a back-and-forth.

Do it again

Run the same question three times. By the third, the words come without thinking — that is the whole point.

Start speaking today

Your first 600 credits are free — no credit card. Sign in and have your first conversation with Airi.

Start free with Google

Frequently asked questions

Can I practice specific interview questions?

Yes. Ask Airi to act as an interviewer for a particular role, for example "be a hiring manager for a marketing job", and she will ask relevant questions and react to your answers.

Will it correct my grammar?

Airi shows a short "small fix" when you make a mistake and then continues the conversation, so you keep your flow instead of stopping at every error.

How long should my answers be in an English interview?

About one to two minutes for most questions. "Tell me about yourself" should stay under a minute and a half, and a STAR story takes about a minute once you have practised it.

Is it okay to ask the interviewer to repeat a question?

Yes. "Sorry, could you say that again, please?" is polite and normal. It is far better than answering a question you did not understand.

Is it free to try?

Yes. You start with 600 free credits, about eight minutes of speaking, with no credit card. That is enough to run through several interview questions.

Last updated: 2026-10-02