A Zoom interview checklist that starts before the link
Sergei Skrylkov, Founder, Trippi · facts checked against the product on 2026-09-30
Most Zoom interview tips are interview tips with the word Zoom in front. This page is the other kind: the things that are true only because the call is on Zoom — how the link opens, where the audio settings hide, what the other side can see, and how to get help with the questions from inside the browser. Do the checklist once, an hour before, and the platform stops being one of the things you are managing.
Step 1. Decide where the call will open: app or browser
A Zoom link tries to open the desktop app. If the app is installed, it will, and that is fine for most people. Two reasons to join in the browser instead: you are on a work laptop that does not allow installs, or you want a browser extension to hear the call — live translation, a copilot, captions in your language. Extensions cannot hear the desktop app; they can hear a browser tab. To join in the browser: open the link, let the “Open Zoom” prompt fail or cancel it, and click Join from Your Browser at the bottom of the page. Some hosts disable this option; if the link is missing, ask the recruiter to enable browser joining, or accept the app.
Step 2. Test audio in the same place you will use it
Zoom’s desktop app and its browser client have different audio settings. Test in the one you are going to use. In the browser, the microphone and speaker choice is in the arrow next to the mute button; pick the headset, not the laptop, for both. Say a sentence and watch the level meter move. Then open the link for real, ten minutes early, into the waiting room.
Step 3. Know what your screen shows
Zoom shares a window or a screen only when you click Share. Until then, the interviewer sees your camera and nothing else. If a coding round asks you to share your screen, share the window — the editor, the browser tab with the exercise — not the whole display. Anything you are reading in another window then stays yours. This is also the honest answer to “can they see my notes”: not unless you share the screen they are on.
Step 4. Set the frame
Camera at eye level, light in front of you, not behind. Zoom’s Touch up and Blur are fine; a virtual background with a beach is not. Turn on Hide self view in the tile menu if watching yourself makes you worse — most people are.
Step 5. Get the questions on your screen as text
If English is not your first language, or the interviewer is fast, this is the step that changes the call. With Zoom open in the browser tab, click the Trippi Cue icon in Chrome. From that click it listens to the tab’s audio — the sound Zoom is already playing to you — and shows each line as recognised, with a translation under it in the language you pick. When a question is addressed to you, a short card appears with a structure to answer from: three points, written from the last minutes of the conversation and from the note you typed before the call. Your microphone is not used, nothing joins the meeting, and no participant appears. The window is drawn inside your browser tab; it is visible to the interviewer only if you share that tab. It does not work with the Zoom desktop app, which is the reason Step 1 exists.
Step 6. The last minute
Close every tab that can make a sound. Phone face down, not silent — a call that vibrates on the desk is audible. Water within reach, off camera. If you are using Trippi Cue, type the note: the role, the company, the one project you want to come back to, and the salary range you decided. Then click the icon once the call is connected, not before.
If the call drops
Rejoin with the same link; Zoom will put you back in. Say “sorry, I dropped for a moment — the last thing I heard was your question about the migration” and continue. The lines in the Trippi Cue window keep the last minutes, so the last thing you heard is on screen.
FAQ
About the platform.
Can I do a Zoom interview without installing Zoom?+
Yes, through the browser client — the “Join from Your Browser” link under the app prompt. The host can disable it, so check the link the day before.
Does Trippi Cue work in the Zoom app?+
No. It is a Chrome extension and hears a browser tab. Join in the browser and it works; in the desktop app it cannot hear anything.
Can the interviewer see my other windows?+
Only what you share. If you share one window, they see that window. If you share the whole screen, they see everything on it.
Should I use a virtual background?+
Blur is fine. A picture is a distraction and, on a weak laptop, a flicker around your head.
What if my interviewer is hard to understand?+
Ask them to repeat — once is normal. For the rest of the call, live captions in your language from an extension keep every line on screen as text.
Read next
Join from the browser. The rest follows.
Trippi Cue is in the Chrome Web Store. One click on the icon when the call begins, and nothing before that.