AI interviews

AI interviews can be used to screen candidates through structured video responses that are scored instantly by AI.

While skills tests measure specific abilities, AI interviews give you deeper insight into a candidate’s communication, behavioral competencies, and role experience. Each interview is scored against clear rubrics, and you can review, override, and add comments at any time.

Approx. reading time 6 minutes

In this article 

1. AI interviews: Introduction and cost
2. Adding AI interviews
3. Previewing the AI interview experience
4. Candidate experience
5. Evaluating candidate responses
6. Common questions

AI interviews: Introduction and cost

AI interviews are structured screening interviews where candidates respond to a set of video questions. Their answers are scored instantly by a skills-trained AI against clear rubrics, delivering consistent, explainable, and comparable results across every applicant.

They replace manual phone screens and basic video tools with a faster, fairer process — one where every candidate is evaluated against the same criteria. You stay in full control throughout: reviewing results, overriding scores, and leaving comments wherever needed.

Availability and pricing

Available on all plans at 2 credits per candidate. The Free Forever plan includes 1 interview with up to 8 questions. Access to the TestGorilla AI interview library requires a Plus plan. Read the full guide here.

When to use AI interviews

AI interviews work best when depth and nuance matter — for complex or high-impact roles in areas like engineering, sales, or leadership, where behavioral insight is essential to making the right hire.

Adding AI interviews

Prefer to see it in action? Watch this short walkthrough to learn exactly how to add an AI interview to your assessment.

To begin adding an AI interview, you first need to create a new assessment or edit an existing one.

AI interviews can be added when you reach Step 2: Assessment in the assessment creation process. On the Assessment page, select AI interviews alongside any skills tests or custom questions you wish to include. You can add one AI interview per assessment.

In Step 3: Configuration, you choose your interview from the library or build a custom one with your own questions and scoring criteria. Explore custom AI interviews. If you added a job description in Step 1, you will see suggestions that match it. Before you save, you will be asked to choose a format for the interview: Animation: candidates see an audio-only animation that responds as the AI speaks. Persona: candidates see a humanoid persona, randomly assigned from a pool of personasTestGorilla maintains. You cannot pick a specific persona. Pick the format that fits your brand and audience. Only the look changes. The questions, scoring, and scientific rigor stay the same. The format is locked once you save the interview, so review it before adding the assessment to a job. Below is an overview of what you can do when configuring your interview: View details: Click on an interview for a more detailed description of what the interview covers as well as see how long the candidate will have, how many questions they’ll be asked, and the difficulty level. Add an interview: Click Add to include the interview in your assessment. Remove an interview: If you change your mind, click on the trash can icon to remove it. Browse library: If none of the suggestions fit, use the Browse library button to explore the full set of available interviews. Filter by AI Fluency: Quickly identify which interviews assess candidates' AI fluency without having to browse through the whole list. Use this filter to show only AI-fluency-relevant interviews. Relevant interviews are tagged with an "AI Fluency" tag. To completely remove AI interviews from your assessment, click on the options in the top right corner and select Remove tool.

Get familiar with the AI interview experience

In the assessment flow, you can:

• Read the Overview, Description, and Covered Skills sections to orient you to the content and purpose of the interview.

• Watch a demo video to see what candidates experience during the interview. 

• Review the questions the AI will ask, regardless of the format you choose.

Demo videos appear in two places:

• Test preview: within the AI Interview preview tab.

• AI interview details: displayed alongside the overview content.

This helps you see what candidates will see in either format before you include the interview in your assessment.

Candidate experience

Once your AI interview is added to the assessment, candidates complete it as part of their normal assessment flow. The experience is designed to be clear, fair, and structured, giving candidates the chance to show more than what’s on their resume.

• Meet the AI: Candidates are greeted by the role-aware AI, receive simple instructions, and respond to structured questions. They will see the format you picked: an animation or a persona.

• Answer structured questions: The AI asks each question, gives candidates time to answer, and checks whether they would like to add more before moving on.

• Stay in control: At any point, candidates can pause, ask for clarification, or add details, just like in a real screening interview.

What candidates will see during the interview:

• The AI animation or persona appears in the center of the screen.

• The candidate's own video preview shows in the corner.

• A timer at the top tracks overall time.

Supportive messaging helps candidates stay at ease, and at the end, the AI provides a closing note and asks them to click Finish to complete. Depending on the format, interviews typically take 10–20 minutes.

Evaluating candidate responses

Every AI interview is scored using structured rubrics created by TestGorilla’s science team. Candidate responses are evaluated on a 0–5 scale for each criterion, with reasoning provided for transparency. Rubrics are pre-built by TestGorilla’s Science and IP specialists, and each rubric is grounded in validated behavioral and role-specific frameworks to ensure fairness and consistency.

• See the criteria being evaluated and the 0–5 rating for each one.
• Review the reasoning behind every score so you can agree with the result or edit it as needed.
• Keep full control of hiring decisions by adjusting scores whenever necessary.

AI scoring focuses only on the content of candidate responses. Factors such as tone, accent, or appearance are not evaluated. For more details on how TestGorilla uses AI responsibly, see our AI FAQ.

How to use:

	From the overview page, click on the candidate you would like to view responses for. Next, click directly on an AI interview to view a detailed breakdown of the scoring.
	Candidate responses are scored out of 5 for each criterion.  You can replay the interview, view the transcript, and search within the video. For interviews recorded in the audio-only animation format, the AI side of the recording does not show up. The candidate's video and the full transcript are still there. An info banner appears above the video with a link to "View candidate experience" so you can see what the candidate saw during the interview. If you do not agree with the AI's scoring, edit individual scores directly. The candidate's overall percentile and raw scores update to reflect your changes once you close the modal. Scoring is based only on the transcript of what the candidate said. Tone, fluency, and appearance are not analyzed.
	Scoring custom interviews: When candidates complete a custom interview, the AI scores their responses against your criteria, not generic competencies. You define what a "good" answer looks like for each question, and the AI evaluates accordingly. Scores remain transparent, explainable, and editable — you can override any score when your judgment differs.

Common questions