---
title: "Latham & Watkins video interview questions"
description: "Latham & Watkins' recorded video interview: where it sits in the process, what candidates report being asked, and how to prepare for a single take."
author: "David Anderton-Yang"
date: "2026-08-25"
canonical: "https://www.tryvoomer.com/blog/latham-watkins-video-interview-questions-what-to-expect"
---

# Latham & Watkins video interview questions

> Latham & Watkins' recorded video interview: where it sits in the process, what candidates report being asked, and how to prepare for a single take.

Published 2026-08-25 by David Anderton-Yang on [the Voomer® blog](https://www.tryvoomer.com/blog).


Latham & Watkins gives you 72 hours to finish its online assessment once you've submitted your application form, and a short timed video interview question sits at the end of that assessment.[^lw]

The video question is the only timed piece in an otherwise untimed assessment.[^lw]

Strong candidates underprepare for exactly this part. Recorded answers are the most unnatural thing in any application, because there's nobody on the other side to read and no follow-up question or human insight to rescue a weak first sentence. You can write a good "why commercial law" answer. Saying it to a lens, on a timer, while you can see yourself is a different skill, and it's the one this part of the assessment measures. Latham hires its trainees exclusively through its vacation schemes, two a year with roughly 30 places each, so this recording stands between you and the only route in.[^lw]

## What the Latham & Watkins video interview actually is

The video part is a [one-way interview](https://www.tryvoomer.com/blog/define/one-way-interview), the [asynchronous](https://www.tryvoomer.com/blog/define/async-interview) format where a question appears on screen, you record your answer to your own webcam, and the video goes to the firm. If this is your first one, our post [what an AI video interview is](/blog/what-is-an-ai-video-interview) covers the format from the beginning.

Prepare as though a lawyer sits down and watches what you send. That assumption decides everything further down this page, starting with how high your camera sits.

Pace is where a short answer gets lost. Candidates practicing for Latham on Voomer® average 135 words per minute, well above the platform-wide 110. We all know that lawyers seem to speak quickly, so set your expectations accordingly. Concise, clean, and thoughtful delivery no matter the pace.

## Where the video question sits in the application

Latham's own graduate recruitment FAQ puts the video question inside the online assessment, and it's specific about what that assessment is: a pro bono case study written for the firm, asking for responses to set scenarios.[^lw] The order runs like this.

- **The application form.** Once you submit it the 72-hour clock on the test starts there.[^lw]
- **The online assessment.** An untimed situational judgement test built around the pro bono case study, with a short timed video interview question at the end.[^lw]
- **The assessment day.** An interview, a case study and a written exercise.[^lcn]

Accounts of the recorded stage differ on how many questions it holds. LawCareers.Net's firm profile describes a stage two carrying a critical reasoning test and two video interview questions,[^lcn] and one candidate who sat the stage in a 2020 cycle describes five.[^tcla] Plan for at least one recorded answer, but of course always be ready for more, and sort your room and your camera before you submit the form. You would be surprised how long making a room presentable can take.

Latham also runs its own interview preparation site and points applicants there for each step of the process, and it's worth reading alongside anything else.[^lw]

## The room you're in when you press record

You record this at the end of a case study, in whatever room you sat it in, at whatever hour you chose to start. A video question bolted onto the end of an assessment has a practical problem: you get to it tired, and your laptop is exactly where you put it for reading documents.

So reset the room first. The laptop you pulled close to read scenarios is now too low and too near, and it will film you from below. Raise it to eye height on a stack of books, sit back until your head and shoulders fill the frame, and put a lamp on the desk in front of you if the window has gone dark since you started. The reviewer takes in the frame in the first second, before you finish a sentence.

Then reset yourself. Stand up, walk to the end of the hall and back, and say a few sentences out loud before the first take. A voice that has been silent for an hour comes out flat. Put on the jacket you would have worn to the office: you dressed for a test, and on camera that shows.

Two things to hold on to once you're recording. Keep your eyes on the lens while you answer; the question text sits on the same screen and pulls them off it. And let your first sentence come out slower than feels natural. A timer pushes pace up, and pace is the first thing a reviewer hears, which is why [speaking too fast](/blog/how-to-stop-speaking-too-fast-in-a-video-interview) is worth fixing and [filler words](/blog/how-to-stop-saying-um-in-a-video-interview) worth cutting before this stage.

## Latham & Watkins video interview questions to prepare

One candidate who sat the recorded stage in a 2020 cycle listed five questions, from memory.[^tcla] Treat each one as a theme, since the exact phrasing won't survive to your cycle.

### The five a 2020 candidate remembered

- **What do you think makes a successful business, and can you name one?**
- **Which practice areas interest you, and why?**
- **What skills can you bring to the firm?**
- **How would you stand out as a trainee?**
- **What challenges do clients face in a period of economic and political uncertainty?**

### The motivation questions to prepare anyway

Latham's application form asks about your motivation for joining, and the interview at the assessment center is primarily motivation and competency based.[^cs] The same ground gets covered wherever you meet it.

- **Why do you want to be a commercial lawyer?** The broadest one, and the easiest to answer in a way that could belong to anybody.
- **Why private equity?** Chambers ranks Latham in its top band for private equity buyouts of £500 million and above in the 2026 UK guide, and private equity work sits inside the corporate seat every trainee does.[^cs] Name a deal you followed and say what interested you about it.
- **Why London?** Tie it to your own path: the seat you want, the work this office runs that you can name, what brought you here.
- **What does pro bono mean to you?** The firm's own online test is a pro bono case study, so this isn't decoration.[^lw]
- **Anything you wrote on the form.** Whatever you claimed about a deal or a sector, expect to say it out loud.

## The two question types: motivation and commercial judgement

Both families are about judgement rather than knowledge, and neither has a correct answer waiting to be recited.

Take the successful-business question, because it's the one candidates most often answer badly. A partner listening wants to know whether you can hold a commercial opinion, attach it to something real, and say why it matters to a client, all inside a minute or two. So name one company, give one reason it works, and finish on the consequence for the people who advise it. A candidate who says a business succeeds when it has motivated staff who share its values has said something true and forgettable. A candidate who says a sponsor-backed business succeeds when its debt structure can survive a rate rise, names the deal they read about last month, and closes on what that means for the lawyers documenting the refinancing has answered the same question and sounded like a colleague. Your commercial reading is almost certainly good enough for this already. The work is compressing it, out loud, with nobody there to prompt you.

Why commercial law, why private equity, why this practice area, why London: the wording changes and the test doesn't. Each one wants a reason only you could give, and each falls apart the moment it could be pasted into another firm's form. Latham's FAQ is a useful tell here. The thing the firm chooses to say about its own online test is that the case study is a pro bono one, designed for Latham.[^lw] A candidate who has noticed that, and who can say something specific about why that side of the practice matters to them, is answering the question the firm actually asked. The same goes for private equity. The honest version of that answer names a deal you followed or a client problem you can explain; the weak version names the prestige and hopes nobody notices. If yours still reads like it could belong to any firm on your list, [how to answer "why do you want to work here"](/blog/how-to-answer-why-do-you-want-to-work-here) is the fix.

## Build an answer that lands in one take

Plan against ninety seconds. The firm says the question is timed and doesn't publish a length, so treat ninety seconds as a working budget: at that pace, it holds about 165 words. The budget holds three or four sentences of substance, and a skeleton of a few phrases is enough to hold them.

Say your first sentence out loud before you press record. If it names the practice area and your reason inside fifteen words, the rest of the answer has somewhere to go.

- **Answer in the first sentence.** Name the practice area and the reason in the same breath. A recording that spends twenty seconds clearing its throat has spent a fifth of the answer.
- **Close on the client.** Finish on what it means for the business or the lawyers advising it. That last sentence is what a reviewer carries into the next application.

Here's the shape of that on "which practice areas interest you, and why?". Ten seconds in, you've named corporate and said why: the deals you keep reading about are the ones where a buyer is acquiring its way into a product line. Thirty seconds goes on one of them. Latham's corporate team worked with Canva on its acquisition of the Serif Group, extending Canva's suite of visual communication tools.[^cs] Twenty seconds goes on what a buyer needs to be sure of before it signs something like that, and why diligence on a software business is its own job. You're at a minute, you have thirty seconds of slack, and you've said more than a full ninety of "I'm drawn to the variety" ever could.

If a question turns behavioral, a time you worked under pressure or handled a disagreement, [the STAR method](/blog/star-method-the-job-interview-cheat-code) gives you the same four-beat discipline in a different frame.

Then take a cold run at both question types, one motivation and one commercial, timed and in the room you've just set up. Check two things afterwards: whether you finished inside the budget, and where your pace landed against everyone else who recorded that answer. Being bad at this in private costs nothing, and a training ground is where that's supposed to happen.

Law candidates, compared to other industries, often come into video recordings hot with a very fast pace. Anxiety, type A personality, and a timer ticking are the usual suspects here. Remember presentation, confidence and composure are key on video - not just saying everything you wanted to. Don't sacrifice composure for content.

Latham isn't the only firm screening this way, so if you have another recorded stage in the diary, the [AlphaSights recorded interview guide](/blog/alphasights-hirevue-interview-questions-what-to-expect) walks through preparing for a one-way interview at a professional-services firm.

**[Practice these question types on Voomer®](https://app.tryvoomer.com)** and you'll see your pace and your filler words scored against other candidates. Start with [one-way interview practice](/ai-interview-practice), or take a [first free session](/free-trial) and find out where you actually sit.

Somebody at the firm will watch this recording with your application form open beside it, deciding whether you're worth a day of assessment-center time. Ten run-throughs of the two question types is what turns that from a hope into a reasonable bet, and you have three days to get them done.

  
    The firm's own graduate recruitment FAQ describes a short timed video interview question at the end of the online assessment.[^lw] LawCareers.Net's profile describes a stage two with two video interview questions,[^lcn] and one candidate from a 2020 cycle lists five.[^tcla] Prepare for at least one and be ready for more; the preparation is the same either way.
  
  
    72 hours from submitting your application form.[^lw] The video interview question at the end is the timed piece inside it. Sort your camera height and your light before you start the assessment.
  
  
    Motivation and commercial judgement. Latham's form asks about your motivation for joining, and the assessment-center interview is primarily motivation and competency based.[^cs] One candidate from a 2020 cycle lists five questions from the recording: what makes a business successful, which practice areas interest you, what skills you can bring, how you would stand out as a trainee, and what challenges clients face in an uncertain economy.[^tcla] Prepare the themes; the recording rewards a real opinion over a recited one.
  
  
    Prepare for a person watching it, since the firm doesn't say what reviews the recording. A person is the safer assumption anyway, because it covers what a human notices and software wouldn't: how high your camera sits, and whether you sound like you want the job.
  
  
    Prepare as though you can't. Record the take you would be happy to send, because you may not get a second one, and an answer built to survive one pass is stronger anyway.
  
  
    Record real answers under a real timer, then get feedback on how you came across. On <a href="https://www.tryvoomer.com/free-trial" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Voomer®</a> you practice on company-specific question banks and see your pace and filler words ranked against other candidates, so you know where your pace actually sits.
  

[^lw]: Latham & Watkins, "London Graduate Recruitment: FAQs," https://www.lwcareers.com/en/beginning-your-legal-career/united-kingdom/london-graduate-recruitment-faqs (accessed August 2026).

[^lcn]: LawCareers.Net, "Latham & Watkins Training Contracts & Work Placements," https://www.lawcareers.net/Solicitors/Latham-Watkins (accessed August 2026).

[^cs]: Chambers Student, "Latham & Watkins: True Picture," https://www.chambersstudent.co.uk/latham-watkins/true-picture/234/1 (accessed August 2026).

[^tcla]: The Corporate Law Academy, "Latham & Watkins Video Interview," https://www.thecorporatelawacademy.com/forum/threads/latham-watkins-video-interview.2088 (February 2020).

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