Consulting vs. Revolut Case Interviews: What's Actually Different

(Preparing for Revolut's PS interview? The first structured course built specifically for this process is available here: Revolut Problem-Solving Interview — Complete Preparation Course)

If you've prepared for consulting case interviews at McKinsey, BCG, or Bain, you have a head start on Revolut's Problem-Solving interview.

The underlying skills overlap: structured thinking, hypothesis-driven analysis, working with data, communicating clearly. But the format is different enough that candidates who rely exclusively on consulting prep consistently run into the same problems, and understanding those differences before you walk into the room can save you a lot of wasted preparation time.

I know this firsthand, as some of my clients are former consultants who went through Revolut's process a first time, didn't pass, and came to me the second time around.

Of course they weren't lacking analytical skills, but they were applying the wrong habits to a format that expects something more specific.

I have written this article to break down the most important distinctions, so you can build on what you already know rather than starting from scratch.

The Clarifying Questions Phase

In a consulting case interview, clarifying questions are brief. You confirm your understanding of the problem, maybe ask one or two targeted questions, and move quickly into structuring. The expectation is that you demonstrate your ability to handle ambiguity, not that you eliminate it entirely before you start.

Revolut's PS interview works differently. Clarifying questions are a phase with a specific purpose: to gather the data you need to build a focused, prioritised analysis rather than a generic one.

A strong PS candidate covers four dimensions before touching the problem:

• Context: what is the broader situation and what has changed recently?

• Efficiency drivers: what are the key metrics that define the problem, how have they moved, and across which segments?

• Objective and success definition: what does a good outcome look like, and is there a specific target or timeline?

• Constraints: what limitations will shape the solution space?

The data collected here directly determines which branches of your issue tree you go deep on and which you deprioritise before you even start building.

Candidates who rush through this phase (because that's what consulting prep trains you to do) arrive at the structuring phase without the information they need to prioritise effectively.

The practical difference: in a consulting interview, two or three clarifying questions is normal. In a Revolut PS interview, a thorough clarifying questions phase might involve many more. One of my clients asked 16 clarifying questions (yeap) before touching the structure, and at the end of the interview, his interviewer specifically said he was glad the candidate had taken the time to fully understand the problem before building. He passed as a senior S&O, by the way.

And there's an efficiency dimension here that's easy to miss. Many candidates struggle to finish the case and find the root cause, because they didn't use the clarifying questions phase to prioritise. They go equally deep on every branch of their structure because they didn't collect the data that would have told them where to focus. The clarifying questions phase goes beyond understanding the problem, it makes the rest of the case faster.

The Structure

The underlying logic is the same: break the problem down into MECE components, go deep where the data points, and stay shallow everywhere else.

The difference between consulting and Revolut expectations in how prescriptive the approach is supposed to be.

In consulting interviews, standard frameworks such as 3Cs (business situation), market entry frameworks, the 4Ps are widely used and generally accepted as starting points. Customisation is encouraged, but a well-applied framework is often enough to demonstrate structured thinking.

In a Revolut PS interview, the expectation is higher. The structure should emerge from the problem, not be applied to it. There are three types of issue trees that appear regularly:

1. Equation-based: Used when the metric can be expressed as a meaningful mathematical relationship. Profit = Revenue − Costs. If profit has declined, the cause must sit within one of those variables, and the equation tells you exactly where to look.

2. Logic-based: Used when the problem requires causal reasoning, e.g.: why is something happening? Each branch represents a distinct logical possibility, and together they cover the full picture. Think of a doctor diagnosing a patient: they don't guess. They decompose the problem systematically, such as lifestyle, genetics, environment, and prioritise based on what's most likely given the available evidence.

3. Flow-based: Used when the problem sits within a sequential process or funnel. If conversion is low, the issue is concentrated at a specific stage. The data tells you which one, and that's where the analysis focuses.

The key skill is choosing the right type for the specific problem and adapting other layers considering what makes sense for the context and problem given.

A structure that looks like a generic framework applied on top of the problem, rather than built from it, signals to a Revolut interviewer that the candidate is working from a template rather than thinking through the problem.

The Math

Case math exists in both formats, but the role it plays is slightly different.

In consulting interviews, math tends to be about market sizing, estimation, or financial modelling. The emphasis is often on making reasonable assumptions and working through calculations using mental math.

In a Revolut PS interview, math appears in a more specific context: sizing a root cause or evaluating a solution. The question being answered is almost always one of three things: can this actually be a root cause? how significant is this finding? or is this lever large enough to be worth acting on?

The approach is the same regardless of the calculation type: clarify what needs to be calculated, define the logic before touching numbers, request the data you need, perform the calculation step by step, and interpret the result. What does this number mean for the goal? Does it close the gap? Is it significant enough to prioritise?

Generating Solutions

This is where the gap between consulting prep and Revolut prep tends to be most visible (and most costly).

In consulting interviews, the brainstorming phase is often evaluated on breadth and creativity. You're expected to generate a range of ideas across relevant dimensions and demonstrate business sense in how you frame them. The emphasis is on the quality of the idea, not the detail of its execution.

In a Revolut PS interview, that's not enough. And I've seen exactly how this plays out: some of my clients arrived at the correct root cause, genuinely good analytical work, but didn't pass because they stopped there.

They hadn't gone deep enough into the context to isolate the problem fully and give specific, targeted solutions. In a PS interview, listing ideas is the starting point for the next phase!

Two things that are frequently missing from candidates who come from consulting prep:

First, solutions need to be structured. Free brainstorming, listing whatever comes to mind, produces generic ideas that are hard to prioritise and often don't address the actual root cause.

A strong candidate organises their ideas before generating them, using the same logic that drove the diagnosis (prioritisation, hypotheses, validation).

Second, solutions need a plan for implementation and metrics to tell if these are sound. 

In a consulting interview, recommending a solution is usually where the case ends. In a Revolut PS interview, a complete answer includes defining how you would execute the idea, measure success, and monitor for unintended side effects.

This distinction reflects something real about how Revolut operates: It's a data-driven company where decisions are measured, iterated on, and held accountable to outcomes. Candidates who demonstrate that way of thinking (not just what to do, but how to do and how know if it worked) stand out clearly from those who don't.

A good number of clients of mine who went this far in their answers, explaining exactly how they would implement their solutions and defining precise KPIs, were evaluated as senior-level candidates by their interviewers, despite having applied for jr/mid-level positions.

The Bottom Line

The skills that make someone good at consulting case interviews, like structured thinking, hypothesis-driven analysis, clear communication, are genuinely useful in a Revolut PS interview. They're not irrelevant, and if you've invested time in that kind of prep, you're not starting from zero.

But the format rewards a different level of precision: More thorough clarifying questions, issue trees built from the problem rather than applied to it, math interpreted as a decision, not just a result and solutions that go beyond ideas to include implementation and measurement.

The candidates who struggle are usually the ones who applied consulting prep habits to a format that expects something more actionable (and some of them only realised that the second time around).

Make sure to take these instructions into consideration, and good luck with your Problem Solving Interview!

Written by Mariana Zarth, former McKinsey consultant, former Nubank Senior Product Ops Manager, and #1 Revolut PS interview coach across platforms, with a Problem Solving pass rate 4x higher than the UK benchmark.

Preparing for Revolut's PS interview? The first structured course built specifically for this process is available here: Revolut Problem-Solving Interview — Complete Preparation Course