Questions, answered

No. Your first interview is free with no sign-in. Sign in afterwards to see your full report and get one more free interview.

It makes the interview much better, because questions are built from your roles, numbers and pivots. On your phone without it? Choose “Start without a resume” and you'll get a realistic general interview. You can add your resume later from your profile.

Free interviews are 15 minutes. With a plan you can also pick 30 minutes, the length of a real HBS interview.

Simple is one tap: your resume, an HBS interview, a surprise interviewer style. Advanced (recommended) lets you pick the school, style, voice and length, tell the interviewer what to press you on, and add essays or your application for sharper follow-ups.

A spoken, one-on-one conversation with an AI interviewer who has read your resume. She asks one question at a time, follows up when an answer is vague, sometimes goes several layers deep on one project, and may cut in if you ramble, the way real interviewers do.

From real HBS interviews: we hand-picked the foundational questions from interviews candidates actually had, then the interviewer tailors them to your resume. They are not a prediction of what you will be asked.

It's hand-tailored for HBS. You can also pick Stanford GSB, Wharton, Kellogg, Booth, MIT Sloan or Columbia; for those the interviewer relies more on general knowledge of the school. Core questions like why an MBA, leadership and setbacks come up everywhere.

Relaxed is warm with few follow-ups. Average is a neutral, typical board member. Intense is brisk and skeptical and pushes hard on vague answers. Average is the default. “Surprise me” picks one at random, because real interviewers vary.

Yes. Talk over her and she stops. Ask her to repeat or rephrase and she will. If you need a moment, say so and take it.

Usually not. HBS is known for leaving no time for your questions, so most interviews end on time or with “Is there anything we didn't get to talk about?”. Other schools keep the usual closing questions.

Yes. Keep the screen open during the interview: switching apps or locking your phone pauses your microphone. The site keeps your screen awake while the interview runs.

Click the icon to the left of the address bar (on a phone, the “aA” or lock icon), allow the microphone for mbastudybuddy.com, then reload the page.

Run “Test your mic” on the start screen first, and use wired headphones in a quiet room if you can. During the interview, watch the badge under “You” during the interview. “Speak a little louder” means move closer to the mic; “Background noise” means find a quieter spot or use headphones; “No sound from your mic” means it's muted or the wrong mic is selected in your browser.

Calls take over your phone's microphone and sound, and afterwards the interview can go quiet or stop hearing you. Press Reconnect when the message appears: you get your mic and sound back and continue the same interview. Turning on Do Not Disturb before you start avoids it.

Press Reconnect and you'll pick up the same interview where you left off. If it keeps failing, choose “End and get my report”: you still get feedback on what you said.

That's normal: when the mic is on, Bluetooth switches to a lower-quality call mode. Wired headphones or your laptop's mic with headphones sound best.

A score out of 100, a summary, what you did well, the top things to fix with your exact words quoted and what to say instead, a 2-minute drill for next time, category scores, how you sounded (pace, filler words, pauses), a check for common trip-ups, and the full transcript with your recordings.

Structure (a clear arc), relevance and specificity (real names, numbers, results), conciseness, confident language, and consistency with your resume.

Without signing in you see your score, the summary, your top strength and the #1 thing to fix. Sign in (free) to unlock the rest; the interview moves into your account.

No. Scores are automated practice feedback, not admissions advice, and say nothing about your chances. Use them to see what to tighten.

Yes. Every interview is saved to your account, and after a few you get a progress page with your trend, habits that keep showing up, and the stories you rely on.

2 interviews of 15 minutes: one before you sign in, one after. There are a limited number of free interviews each day; if they're all taken, come back tomorrow or start with a plan.

Interview time, from when the interviewer starts until the interview ends. Setup and reading your report are free, and an interview where you didn't answer anything doesn't count.

Pro is billed weekly: $34.99 a week for 120 minutes, best if your interview is days away. Max is billed monthly: $99.99 a month for 480 minutes. If you'll prep for more than about three weeks, or for several schools, Max costs less than paying for Pro week after week.

An interview always runs to its end. After that you can upgrade to Max, or buy a top-up of 90 minutes for $19.99. Top-up minutes roll over and never expire; you use them while you have a plan.

Plan minutes don't. They reset to the full amount when your plan renews (every week on Pro, every month on Max), so use them or lose them. Top-up minutes are different: they roll over and stay until you use them. Like plan minutes, they work while you have a plan; if yours ends, they wait for you until you subscribe again.

Anytime: tap your initial at the top right, then Manage subscription. You keep your minutes until the end of the period you've paid for.

They're used to run your interviews and write your reports, and you can replay and review them anytime. Before anything is used to improve our interviewer, we remove personal details like names, contact details, employers and schools. If you delete your account, we delete your account details and remove personal details from what we keep. Our speech and AI providers process them only to run the service.

Yes. “Remove from my history” hides an interview from you. Deleting your account (from your profile) removes your email, profile and sign-in and strips your name and contact details from everything else. If you have a plan, we cancel it at the same time; the rest of the paid period isn't refunded.

MBA Study Buddy was founded by Dewan Ahmed, HBS ’26, who went through the HBS interview as an applicant. We built the realistic practice that was missing.

No. MBA Study Buddy is an independent practice tool, founded by an HBS alum. No one at HBS or HBS Admissions has reviewed or endorsed it.