Companies Use AI Chatbots for Initial White-Collar Interviews as Some Job Seekers Drop Out

Business Insider reported that companies including Coinbase, Zapier, and Experis have deployed AI chatbots to conduct initial interviews for white-collar roles below the director level. Bijo Thomas, a 45-year-old tech professional from Austin, completed a 30-minute interview this spring with an AI system named Sophie at Experis.

The chatbot appeared as a realistic businesswoman avatar with brown hair pulled back and a white top, smiled, gestured, and asked follow-up questions.

Thomas received the senior AI solutions architect role after two additional human interviews and started in May. Coinbase began rolling out an AI interviewer named Milo in August 2025. The company has hired more than 240 people initially screened by the system.

Coinbase receives about 1.5 million job applications per year. Zapier started experimenting with AI interviews in fall 2025 after some postings drew thousands of applicants within hours. The technology has allowed the company to screen up to five times as many candidates as it normally would.

Approximately one-third of Zapier candidates who advanced to a hiring manager interview would not have advanced based on application and résumé alone. An April survey commissioned by Greenhouse of nearly 3,000 active job seekers found that 63 percent of U.S. respondents had been interviewed by AI in the prior 12 months.

The same survey found 57 percent of German respondents, 54 percent of Australian respondents, 47 percent of U.K. respondents, and 36 percent of Irish respondents had participated in AI-led interviews. The Greenhouse survey also found that 38 percent of job seekers had walked away from a hiring process at least once because it included an AI-led interview, while another 12 percent said they would walk away if required to participate.