Google Interview Warmup Is Gone: How to Practice With Gemini Live Instead

If you open grow.google/interview-warmup today, you land on an interview tips article from Grow with Google instead of the practice tool. The Internet Archive shows Warmup still running in early March 2026; by late March, the address redirected.

Google's advice in that article is short: “Practice interviewing in real-time with Gemini Live to master the STAR method.” Gemini Live can run a mock interview, but it won't set one up for you. Warmup gave you the questions and the feedback format. With Gemini Live, you have to ask for both.

What Google Interview Warmup did

If you liked Warmup, these are the parts to ask Gemini Live for.

Google launched Interview Warmup in June 2022, as its launch post explains. You picked a field, such as data analytics, IT support, project management or UX design, or chose general questions. You answered out loud and watched a live transcript.

After each answer, Warmup pointed out:

• Job-related terms you used.
• Words you repeated often, with alternatives.
• Talking points you covered, such as your experience, skills and goals.

It never graded you. In Google's words, “Your responses aren't graded or judged and you can answer questions as many times as you want.” That made practice less stressful. But Warmup couldn't tell you if an answer was good enough, and it never asked a follow-up question.

What changes when you practice with Gemini Live

Gemini Live can ask you follow-up questions, which Warmup never did. But it knows nothing about your interview unless you tell it.

Gemini Live is the voice conversation mode in the Gemini mobile app. Unlike Warmup, it replies to what you said. It can ask a follow-up, question a vague answer, or ask about your actual job. Google's article says it can give “instant, structured feedback on your responses.”

It also won't set anything up for you. Gemini picks the questions unless you give it some. It doesn't know what interviewers for your role look for. And you have to explain what you want at the start of every session.

Use this table to decide what to ask Gemini Live for. The left column is what Warmup did on its own. The right column is what to do in Gemini Live to get the same thing.

Warmup gave you	In Gemini Live, you need to
Questions picked for your field	List the questions yourself, or name your role and level and ask for behavioral questions for it
A transcript of each answer	Reread the conversation in your Gemini chats after the session
Notes on job terms, repeated words and talking points	Ask for that review after each answer
No grading	Decide if you want to be graded; if you do, say what a good answer includes
No follow-up questions	Ask for a follow-up before the feedback

What to say at the start of a Gemini Live session

Without instructions, Gemini may chat or rewrite your answer for you. Reading this out first makes it act like an interviewer.

Start Gemini Live and read this out, filling in the brackets:

Run a mock behavioral interview for a [role] at [level].
Ask me one question at a time, in this order:
[question 1], [question 2], [question 3].
Let me finish each answer. I'll say "done" when I'm finished.
After each answer, ask one follow-up about something I left vague.
After I answer the follow-up, give short feedback in this order:
1. In one sentence, what I said I personally did.
2. What an interviewer would still need to know: what was at stake, what I decided and why, and what happened.
3. Any words or phrases I repeated.
Don't rewrite my answer. Then move to the next question.

Pick the questions yourself, so you practice ones your role is likely to get. Job postings and interview guides for your role are a good place to find them.

If you pause, Gemini may think you're done. If it cuts in while you're thinking, say you weren't finished and keep going. A short pause is normal in a real interview too: one data-science interviewer said they would rather wait than hear an answer that starts immediately and wanders.

Check the feedback before you rely on it. Give one weak answer on purpose, such as “We worked together and the launch went well.” If Gemini praises it, ask it to be stricter, like a skeptical interviewer, and try again.

How to review your answers after the session

Practice helps most when you answer the same question again with one thing fixed. Warmup let you do that, and you can do it with Gemini Live too.

Open the conversation in your Gemini chats and check each answer:

• Your part. When you describe the key decision, do you say “I” or only “we”?
• The result. Could someone repeat what happened in one line?
• The setup. How long did you spend on background before saying what you did? The same interviewer names long, wandering answers as one of the most common errors they see.
• The follow-up. Which follow-up made you hesitate? Product hiring managers on Reddit advise answering follow-ups with real numbers, the people involved, and the arguments against your choice.

Pick one thing to fix and answer the same question again. Don't memorize a script. Engineering interviewers on Reddit say they want a real answer, not a rehearsed one. A memorized answer is also hard to adapt when a follow-up comes.

When Gemini Live is enough, and when to use an interview practice tool

Gemini Live is free and flexible. The question is whether you want to set it up and check its feedback yourself every time.

Gemini Live works well if you already know which questions your role gets and can tell when its feedback is wrong.

An interview practice tool makes more sense if you want questions picked for your role, feedback that's consistent between attempts, and nothing to set up each time.

Kora is one option. You choose one of six roles, answer its questions out loud, and respond to follow-ups.

Each Kora question comes with a set list of what a strong answer should show. We build and review those lists in advance from what interviewers say they look for. The model doesn't make them up during your session. So every attempt is checked against the same list, and you can see what improved.

Whichever you use, check two things. It should ask follow-up questions, and it should tell you what your answer was missing, not only whether you sounded confident.