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HackerRank launches AI job interviewer Chakra after conducting 500,000 beta interviews
HackerRank's AI interviewer Chakra processed over 500,000 beta interviews and is now generally available. Allowing candidates to use AI during sessions cut suspicious activity flags by 70% to 80%.
HackerRank has launched Chakra, an AI agent that conducts and scores technical job interviews, moving the tool to general availability after a six-month beta that processed over 500,000 interviews. For HR and management professionals, the launch signals a shift in how organizations can assess technical talent - consolidating recruiter screens, take-home assignments, and live coding rounds into a single AI-led session.
The company reports that beta participants included Snowflake, Snorkel, and Capgemini. One counterintuitive finding: allowing candidates to use AI tools during the interview reduced suspicious activity flags by 70% to 80% compared to traditional proctored assessments. The logic is straightforward - when candidates are permitted to use AI openly, the incentive to secretly run external tools disappears.
How Chakra evaluates candidates
Unlike conventional coding tests that score only the final output, Chakra observes the candidate's process as they work inside real-world code repositories. An integrated AI assistant is available during the session, and the system evaluates what HackerRank calls "AI fluency" - the candidate's judgment in deciding when and how to use AI, not just whether they arrive at the correct answer.
CEO Vivek Ravisankar argues the approach reduces bias. "AI reduces bias by applying consistent rubrics," he said, though he acknowledged that final hiring decisions remain with human evaluators. The tool generates scores and process observations, but it does not make the hire/no-hire call.
Regulatory scrutiny on automated hiring tools
The launch arrives as automated employment decision tools face growing regulatory attention. New York City now requires independent bias audits for such systems and mandates that candidates be notified when AI is used in hiring decisions. HR teams adopting Chakra or similar tools will need to factor compliance requirements into their implementation plans.
HackerRank positions the product as a way to compress multiple hiring stages into one session, potentially shortening time-to-hire for technical roles. The company has not published pricing details for the generally available version.
Why this matters for HR and management professionals
Chakra's beta data challenges a common assumption - that letting candidates use AI during interviews undermines assessment integrity. The 70% to 80% drop in suspicious activity flags suggests the opposite: transparent AI use may produce cleaner signals about candidate capability. For hiring managers, the takeaway is practical. If your interview process still treats AI use as cheating, you may be measuring a candidate's ability to hide their tools rather than their ability to do the job. Exploring structured AI-for-HR training, such as AI recruitment automation courses, can help teams redesign assessments that reflect how technical work actually gets done in 2025.