On-demand video interviews are now a standard part of cabin crew recruitment at many of the world’s major airlines. If you are applying for a flight attendant role in 2026, there is a good chance you will face one before you ever speak to a human recruiter. Understanding exactly how they work — and what is actually being assessed — is no longer optional preparation. It is the baseline.
In the US, on-demand video interviews are commonly referred to as ODVIs (On-Demand Video Interviews). You will see this term used across airline recruitment forums and job postings. Whether the airline calls it an ODVI, a digital interview, or a video screening, the format is broadly the same.
Insight: Airlines currently known to use on-demand video interviews as part of their cabin crew recruitment process include…
- Delta Air Lines,
- American Airlines,
- Southwest Airlines,
- United Airlines, and
- flydubai.
The list continues to grow. If you are applying to a major carrier and the process includes a video stage before an in-person assessment, this guide applies to you
What Actually Happens in an On-Demand Video Interview
Unlike a live Skype or Teams interview, there is no human on the other end. The process is entirely self-directed:
- You receive an email invitation with a link to a hosted video platform
- You are given a practice question to check your lighting, sound, and camera setup
- Questions are presented one at a time on screen
- You are given approximately 30 seconds to prepare your answer
- The recording starts automatically after your preparation time
- You typically have one to two minutes to record your answer
- Once started, you cannot pause or re-record — some platforms now allow a limited number of re-takes, but do not rely on this
- The whole process usually takes 10-15 minutes
You will typically be asked four to five questions. Some platforms include multiple choice or short written questions alongside the video responses.
How Your Interview Is Actually Assessed
This is where most candidates’ understanding of video interviews is significantly out of date — and where the gap between prepared and unprepared candidates is largest.
The dominant platform used by airlines is HireVue. Rather than a recruiter watching your recording and making a gut judgement, HireVue uses a combination of artificial intelligence and natural language processing to analyse your responses and generate a ranked score. That score is what a recruiter sees first.
What the AI is actually analysing:
The AI does not simply watch you. It analyses the content of what you say using natural language processing — the specific words you use, the complexity and relevance of your language, how well your answer maps to the competencies the airline has defined for the role, and the structure of your response. Each algorithm is purpose-built for the specific job role, which means the Delta flight attendant model assesses different things than, say, the United model or the flydubai model.
Beyond content, the system also evaluates engagement, expressiveness, and consistency across your responses.
What this means for how you prepare:
Because the AI is assessing the content of your answers, structured and specific responses that use relevant language perform better than vague, general ones. This is not about sounding robotic — it is about making sure the substance of what you say is clearly relevant to the role. Competency-based answers using the SOAR or STAR frameworks map well to what the system is looking for.
But here is what the AI does not replace:
Once the AI has ranked candidates, a recruiter reviews the prioritised list and watches recordings before making decisions. HireVue is explicit about this in its own documentation: skilled recruiting specialists and hiring managers decide which candidates progress after reviewing the AI’s output. The AI ranks — humans decide.
That means a recruiter is going to see your face, your grooming, your clothing, your background, and hear every noise in your environment. The AI score gets you onto the list. Everything a recruiter sees when they watch your recording determines whether you progress.
Worth knowing: Although AI has a big say in shortlisting candidates, the final decision is made by a human recruiter who will watch your interview in person. That means that your presentation and demeanour are just as important as the words you say.
What HireVue Says About Bias
HireVue’s published ethical principles state that the system is specifically designed to prevent bias based on age, gender, and ethnicity. The algorithms are tested and audited to ensure protected groups are not adversely impacted, and features that may cause biased results are removed during model development.
For candidates, the practical implication is straightforward: the AI is not going to mark you down because of how you look, how old you are, or where you are from. What it is assessing is the quality, relevance, and structure of what you say. That is a more level playing field than many candidates assume.
Why On-Demand Video Interviews Are Hard
Some candidates take to video interviews naturally. Most, unfortunately, do not… at least not at first.
The absence of a human interviewer removes every piece of feedback you would normally use to calibrate your performance. In a face-to-face interview, you can read the room, adjust your pace, and gauge whether your answer is landing. In an ODVI, you are talking to a screen with no signal coming back. Many candidates either freeze, over-perform into the camera in a way that reads as unnatural, or run out of things to say with 45 seconds still on the clock.
The second major challenge is time pressure. Thirty seconds to prepare an answer is not very long. Without a clear structure already in your head, that time disappears before you have decided where to start.
Both of these challenges are solvable with preparation. Neither is a fixed trait.
Part Two: How to Ace the Interview
The preparation strategy, the practical setup, and the specific techniques that make the difference are covered in full in Part Two of this guide.
You should also read our article on how AI is being used to analyse video interview responses — it goes deeper on what Delta and other US carriers are doing with this technology in 2026.
For structuring your answers, our SOAR guide covers the framework that maps best to how AI systems assess competency-based responses.
