An interview evaluation form is a simple but effective way to assess candidates using consistent, role-specific criteria. It helps interviewers rate applicants, write interview notes, and make clear recommendations. Whether you’re hiring with a team or across multiple interview rounds, these forms help keep everyone aligned and focused on what actually matters for the role.
To make your candidate screening process more efficient and consistent, I’ve created eight free interview evaluation sheets and three interview scorecard templates. You can edit these in Google Sheets or download as PDF files for your in-person, virtual, or panel interviews. Read on to get the templates you need.
Want to streamline your hiring processes? Consider using a recruitment platform like ZipRecruiter. It easily lets you post jobs to over 100 job boards and find candidates using AI technology. To learn more, read our ZipRecruiter review or visit its website.
Simple interview evaluation form
Thank you for downloading!
If you’re hiring for entry-level or operational positions, this simple interview evaluation form is ideal. It has a four-point scale (poor, fair, good, and great) with space for short notes and is optimal for new managers, inexperienced interviewers, and teams that want a clear and easy scoring method.
You can adjust the scoring categories, add your logo, or change the questions to fit your requirements. This interview form template also works well across formats, such as digital and paper-based evaluations.
Role-specific simple interview evaluation forms
Sometimes you need more than a general-purpose form. These templates take the basic structure and apply it to specific roles. For example, candidates for a retail job may need point-of-sale (POS) experience, while applicants for an administrative role may need specific computer expertise.
Browse the tabs below to download role-specific, simple interview evaluation sheets.
Use this template to assess retail job candidates for fit within your business and customer base. This interview evaluation form verifies that candidates have the skills to run a POS system and serve clients.
Thank you for downloading!
Use this form if you’re interviewing candidates for fast-paced food service roles. It helps you assess each applicant fairly and focus on the key traits needed, such as relevant work experience, interpersonal skills, customer service ability, and attention to food safety.
Thank you for downloading!
Use this template if you’re interviewing an administrative assistant. This form contains questions that assess typical job skills needed by a successful admin, such as computer skills and the ability to support others.
Thank you for downloading!
Complex interview evaluation form
Thank you for downloading!
When you’re hiring for more senior or technical roles, such as managers and specialists, you need a template that asks for more than surface-level answers. The complex interview evaluation form includes both job-specific and behavior questions. It gives you and your interviewers room to evaluate how candidates approach job challenges, solve problems, and interact with others.
This interview form template is great for structured interviews, especially when you’re asking follow-up questions or exploring scenarios as part of a STAR interview method. It also works well if you’re conducting panel interviews where different interviewers are focused on different areas of performance or if you’re looking to document results from a detailed behavioral interview.
Role-specific complex evaluation forms
These forms use the same format provided in the complex interview evaluation form and further customize the behavioral and technical questions to suit specific job roles. For example, people managers will need employee management skills, project managers may require project management certifications, and technical specialists may need to have specific hardware or software expertise.
This interview evaluation form contains questions relevant to hiring managerial roles and assesses job competencies that are both hard to develop and critical to the success of a manager/supervisor in an organization.
Thank you for downloading!
Related: Interview Tips for Hiring Managers
Use this template if you’re evaluating candidates for technical skills, such as when hiring an IT professional. You can customize it by listing the specific hardware, software, or project tools the job requires. This form includes 10 behavioral interview questions focused on technical skills, plus 10 general questions about communication, teamwork, and customer service.
Thank you for downloading!
Because project managers do the work of managers without direct supervisory authority, this template contains competencies identified by the Project Management Institute (PMI). These project management skills include the ability to manage conflict, prioritize work, and motivate a self-managed team.
Thank you for downloading!
Interview scorecard templates
Once interviews are complete, it helps to bring the recruiting team’s feedback together in one place. That’s where interview scorecard forms come in. These documents allow you to compare candidates using shared evaluation criteria.
You can input the data, such as interviewer notes and ratings (e.g., poor, fair, good, and great), from the interview evaluation form(s) into the interview score sheet. This way, you can determine the average rating for each candidate and decide, without bias, whether or not you should move the candidate forward in the hiring process.
Similar to the interview forms, these score sheets are editable in Google Sheets. You can also print them, digitize them, or plug them into your applicant tracking system (ATS) to track hiring data. Browse the tabs below to download these interview scorecard templates for free.
Use this interview rating sheet if you utilized the simple interview evaluation form in your applicant screening process. You can transfer each interviewer’s overall rating, notes, and recommendations to the form, as well as score each candidate based on this guide: poor = 1 point, fair = 2 points, good = 3 points, and great = 4 points.
This way, you can see the total and average scores, including how many interviewers recommended moving the candidate to the next stage. It’s also helpful for comparing feedback across interviewers.
Thank you for downloading!
If you’re hiring for a higher-level role and used the complex interview form, this scorecard makes it easy to compare how each interviewer rated the candidate. It’s scored exactly like the simple scorecard form, although the totals and averages will be higher. This is due to the additional number of questions included in the complex interview form (20 vs the simple interview form’s 10 questions).
Thank you for downloading!
Once you’ve finished interviewing candidates for a role, you’ll need a way to summarize and compare applicant performance side by side. This candidate comparison scorecard will help you do that, providing you with an apples-to-apples view of how each person measured up.
It also serves as a fair, consistent record of your recruiting decisions. If questions about hiring bias or unfair practices ever come up, you’ll have clear documentation showing how candidates were evaluated and why one was chosen over another.
Thank you for downloading!
Training interviewers to use interview evaluation forms
Before interviews begin, make sure each interviewer knows how to use your evaluation form properly. Even the most well-designed template won’t help much if people use it inconsistently or skip parts entirely. If you have new managers or inexperienced interviewers, consider providing a quick training on how to conduct an interview, including what not to ask and other common illegal interview questions.
After that session, give all interviewers and training attendees all the interview and scorecard forms that they need to use. Walk them through how to fill them out, such as:
- Complete the basic information at the top, like the interviewer’s name, interview date, candidate’s name, and the position being interviewed for.
- Rate the candidate on each interview question using the checkboxes for poor, fair, good, and great.
- Count how many ratings fall under each rating category and write the totals at the bottom of the form.
- Circle an overall rating, which can be a subject rating and may differ from the numeric score
- Indicate whether the candidate should move forward (yes or no)
- Add any interview notes and comments that explain the recommendation, if needed.
Example of a completed interview evaluation form showing the overall rating, recommendation, and hiring notes.
For the complex interview form, such as those used for managerial or technical positions, you may need to explain the purpose of specific behavioral or skill-based questions. While the scoring method remains the same, the added context will help interviewers understand what to look for.
What to include and avoid in an interview evaluation form
Candidate evaluation templates make interviews easier to manage and play a key role in keeping a compliant and well-documented hiring process. When paired with pre-employment assessments, a structured interview form helps create a more complete picture of each candidate’s qualifications.
Whether you use the above free templates or create your own, an interview evaluation sheet should contain basic candidate information and job-related questions. However, be careful that you don’t include or rate anything that could create legal risk or may violate labor laws.
Use the list below to make sure you’re including the right components and avoiding the ones that could get flagged in an HR compliance audit.
What TO Include | What NOT to Include |
|---|---|
Candidate and interview names | Candidate’s marital or family status |
Job title or position | Candidate’s ethnicity, race, or religious background |
Date and/or time of interview | Candidate’s age or date of birth |
Interview questions with clearly defined criteria (e.g., communication or technical ability) | Candidate’s disability, pregnancy, medical, or health-related information |
Scoring or rating categories | Candidate’s location (it’s okay to indicate the preferred work location) |
Notes or comments sections | Comments about likeability without context or about physical appearance, unless tied directly to safety or professionalism |
Summary rating | |
Recommendation to move to the next hiring step (such as yes or no) |
Legal considerations
In the U.S., several federal laws restrict what you can ask during the interview process and what you should avoid documenting. Failure to follow these guidelines could lead to compliance issues or discrimination claims.
Here are some of the key laws you need to keep in mind:
- Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) pre-employment guidelines: This limits what employers can ask before making a job offer, such as medical or disability-related questions, and restricts pre-offer medical exams. It also explains how to fairly use employment tests and screening tools during the hiring process.
- Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) Title I: This law bans private employers and local government from discriminating against qualified candidates because of a disability.
- Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) uniform guidelines on employee selection procedures: This requires that all interview forms and rating tools be based on job-related criteria and produce fair, consistent results across candidates.
If you use AI tools that transcribe interviews or suggest scores, check state and local laws to ensure compliance. For example, New York’s Local Law 144 requires employers to conduct independent bias audits before using algorithms or AI to screen applicants. It also mandates that candidates be notified when these tools are used in the hiring process.
To learn more about federal and state regulations that can impact recruiting, check out our guide to hiring laws.
Frequently asked questions (FAQs) about interview evaluation forms
These forms contribute to the overall assessment of each candidate, allowing hiring managers to compare performances based on standardized criteria. Decisions are often made by considering both the scores and the qualitative feedback from multiple interviewers.
This depends on the company’s policy. Some organizations may choose to share specific feedback or overall impressions, while others keep these forms confidential as part of their internal assessment processes.
Use a three- or five-point scale, and clearly define what each rating represents. This helps interviewers stay consistent and makes it easier to compare candidates objectively across the same criteria.
