I spent about three weeks testing AI interview tools after a technical screen went badly. Not catastrophically, just badly enough that I knew I needed something to help me stay organized under pressure. LockedIn AI was the first tool I tried, because it shows up first in most searches and has a slick landing page.
Here’s what I found, and why I ended up switching.
LockedIn AI: what it does well
The response latency is genuinely fast. They advertise 116 milliseconds and in my testing on a stable connection it felt about right. For real-time interview coaching that matters, because a tool that lags half a second behind your interviewer’s question is useless.
The integration with Zoom and Google Meet works without a separate download step, which I appreciated. And the multi-language support is real, not just a checkbox claim. I tested it briefly in Spanish and it held up.
That said, the free tier is almost unusable for actually evaluating the product. Ten credits goes fast, and that was my first frustration. I don’t think you can meaningfully test a real-time interview tool with ten minutes of usage. You need at least a full mock session to know if the suggestions fit your style.
Where it fell short for me
Two things stood out. First, the pricing structure is genuinely confusing. There are multiple tiers with overlapping feature sets and a token-based system that makes it hard to estimate monthly cost. I sat with the pricing page for 15 minutes and still wasn’t sure what I’d pay in a heavy job-search month.
Second, the suggestions during mock behavioral questions felt slightly off. They were accurate but formal, in a way that made it harder to sound like myself. Technical questions were fine. Behavioral questions felt like I was being coached by someone who had read a lot of HR content but not worked in the environments I’d worked in.
That’s probably a matter of taste and I’m not sure I’m right about this. But it was consistent across multiple sessions.
Switching to Craqly
Craqly gives you 30 minutes free, no credit card required. That’s enough to run a real mock interview and decide. The setup is simpler, the overlay is built to stay off screen-share captures, and the monthly price is lower than LockedIn AI’s comparable tier.
The thing I noticed most was that the suggestions felt shorter. Not less informative, just less verbose. For behavioral questions, getting a four-word prompt like “discuss scope creep example” is more useful than a full sentence I’d have to mentally edit before speaking. I don’t know if that’s intentional product design or just a different model, but it changed how naturally I could use the suggestions in real-time.
The resume builder is also included at no extra cost. I’ve used it for two applications and the ATS scoring caught a keyword gap I’d missed on both.
A straightforward comparison
| Feature | LockedIn AI | Craqly |
|---|---|---|
| Free trial | 10 credits | 30 minutes, no card |
| Starting price | ~$29.99/month | $19/month |
| Screen-share safe overlay | Yes | Yes |
| Resume builder included | No | Yes |
| Response latency | ~116ms (claimed) | Fast in testing |
Who should still use LockedIn AI
If you’re actively using AI tools in sales calls and professional meetings beyond just job interviews, LockedIn AI’s feature set is broader. It’s built for more than the hiring context. And if multi-LLM support (being able to choose which underlying model is generating suggestions) matters to you, it has that. Craqly doesn’t offer model selection at the moment.
For the specific use case of job interview preparation and live interview assistance, I think Craqly is the better choice on price and ease of setup. That’s my honest read after three weeks of testing both.
According to the LinkedIn Economic Graph, hiring volume for technical roles has been choppy since late 2024, which means more candidates competing for fewer positions. Tools that help you perform under pressure are worth taking seriously. The Stack Overflow Developer Survey 2024 also found that AI tool adoption in development workflows jumped 22 percentage points in a single year, so this category isn’t going anywhere.
If you’re deciding between these two: try Craqly first because the free tier is actually usable, and compare from there.