Updated April 3, 2023

Introduction to Magento Interview Questions And Answers

Magento is an open source e-commerce software, created by Varien Inc., heavily utilized for online business. Magento uses e-commerce platform which offers organization solutions and extensive support. It has a flexible modular architecture, thus makes it scalable with many control options, helpful for end-users. Magento allows users to update the e-commerce website automatically. It is simple to use, quick and versatile, all at the same time. There are multiple benefits comes along with the usage of Magento, like it enables searching and sorting of product in several ways. It also easily integrates with many third-party sites which are required to run an effective e-commerce website. Multiple languages support, currency, tax rates, built-in SEO (Search Engine Optimization) are a few useful features arrive with Magento.

Now, if you are looking for a job which is related to Magento then you need to prepare for the 2023 Magento Interview Questions. It is true that every interview is different as per the different job profiles but still to clear the interview you need to have a good and clear knowledge of Magento. Here, we have prepared the important Interview Questions and Answers which will help you get success in your interview.

Below are the 15 important 2023 Interview Questions and Answers that are frequently asked in an interview. these questions are divided into parts are as follows:

Part 1 – Magento Interview Questions (Basic)

This first part covers basic Magento Interview Questions and Answers

Q1. Define Magento with its architecture?

Answer:
Magento is an e-commerce platform created on open source technology, which provides online business with flexibility and control over the content, appearance, and functionality of their e-commerce store. Its architecture is a PHP MVC (Model-View-Controller) application, where all the Controllers will be in one folder and all Models in another, etc. Based on their functionality files are grouped together, which are referred to as modules in Magento. There are various versions of Magento which includes:

Magento Enterprise
go
Magento Community

Q2. Which technology is used by Magento?

Answer:
This is the most common Magento Interview Questions asked in an interview. There are multiple technologies used by Magento, with its web server and Database components. Its web server is being created using PHP scripting language whereas Database part is taken care of by MySQL. Data model being utilized by MySQL is based on the EAV i.e. Entity-attribute-value model, whose primary feature is that it would store data objects in a tree structure. A benefit of using Tree-like structure is, data structure now can vary without changing database definition. But at the same, EAV based data model approach is expensive and should only be considered, when a developer is not sure about a number of fields in a table and can vary in future. A key benefit of EAV technique is that it allows a developer to add unlimited columns to table virtually, one table would hold all the attribute data and other tables would hold the entity and value against every attribute mentioned.

Let us move to the next Magento Interview Questions And Answer.

Q3. What is difference between Mage::getSingleton() and Mage::getModel()?

Answer:
Mage:getSingleton() does create only single object for a given class. If the object is already being created for the same class, it won’t create it again. As the name suggests, it utilizes a singleton design pattern. Usage of singleton design pattern is applicable in those scenarios, where a developer wants to create a single object only one time and then later keep utilizing the very same object, modify and fetch it, but won’t create a new object. Session object could be an ideal example of this pattern, where a user can add or remove values from session across different pages in an application so that it retains the value but won’t create a new session object. Since creating a new session object means losing your last changes. This is the basic Magento Interview Questions in an interview.

Mage::getModel() does create a new object, with every time, its class is being called. Unlike, Singleton approach, it can be utilized in a scenario, where a developer requires new data from the database.

Q4. What is the difference between EAV and flat model in Magento?

Answer:
Both models are having big differences in their schema and strategy to store the data.
EAV is more of a normalized form of the database model. The primary feature of EAV based approach is that every column value is being stored in its respective data type table. Product and Model related data can be stored in their respective data type table. Product ID, product name, product price, and its creation date would be stored in their respective data type table. It means, a developer needs to join multiple tables to get the product details, which actually brings more complexity as well in EAV based approach.
Unlike EAV based approach, Flat model utilizes a single table. It is not normalized, unlike its EAV counterpart and hence uses more database space. A primary feature of the Flat model is performance since only a single query can load entire product, thus developer need not do complex join queries to get product details, this is the most common Magento Interview Questions asked in an interview.

Q5. Explain the concept of handles in Magento?

Answer:
Structure of a page in Magento is taken care of by Handles. A handle would decide which block needs to be displayed with its location. Handles are called for every page, where every page request can come up with multiple and unique handles. To handle the product page, multiple product handles are being utilized, which belongs to a virtual product type. If a page for simple product needs to be called, its corresponding handle would be called whereas for the virtual product, its virtual handle would be required. Handle for indexes can be generated by combining muster which is a front name and action controller i.e. index. Handles will be called only when its specific URL is being accessed.

Let us move to the Advanced part of Magento Interview Questions And Answer and see how we can crack the interview and get a good job opportunity

Q6. What is codePool in Magento?

Answer:
In order to register a new module in app/etc/modules/sample_module.xml, a developer has to specify a tag file called codePool. There are 3 types of code pool available, starting with Core, which is being utilized by the Core team, Community codepool is used by 3^rd party extensions and local codepool is used for in-hour module development. Local codepool can also override core and community codepool, in case of customer requirement.

Codepool resides at /app/code directory.

Q7. How many types of sessions are available in Magento?

Answer:
There are two types of sessions being used, customer and checkout sessions. All customer related data is locked with customer session whereas data related to order and quotes are stored in the checkout session. Session types are utilized separately since order get placed, check out session data information needs to be flushed. Thus, having two different sessions for order and customer related data makes sense. Example – customer session’s first name will be $_SESSION[‘customer’][‘firstname’]. The similar example works for checkout session as well. This is the useful Magento Interview Questions that are asked in an interview.

Part 2 –Magento Interview Questions (Advanced)

Let us now have a look at the advanced Magento Interview Questions.

Q8. What are the different ways of enhancing the performance of Magento?

Answer:
There are several ways with which we can enhance the performance in Magento, some of them are listed below:

Disable any unused modules
Enable Magento caching
Optimize images
Disable Magento log
Combine external CSS/JS into a single file
MySQL query caching
Enable gzip compression

Q9. What are the ways to optimize the Magento environment and configuration?

Answer:
Several ways can be utilized to optimize the Magento environment, some of them are listed below:

Magento application can be optimized using cloud computing.
JavaScript and CSS can be merged inside a single file which reduces the load time dramatically since its now loading only a single file.
To optimize configuration, do not host files on a web server which are not in use.
Identify and disable unused Magento modules.
To speed up performance, never run MySQL and web server on the same machine.
Upgrade to latest Magento version, which allows performing better.
Magento uses complex databases, so running a database on a dedicated server would improve the performance drastically.

Let us move to the next Magento Interview Questions And Answer.

Q10. What is Magento payment gateway?

Answer:
Payment gateway processes the credit card data securely between customer and merchant, between the merchant and the payment processor. It is like a checkpoint that protects customers from attempting to collect personal and financial information from customers and also act as a mediator between the merchant and sponsoring bank.

Q11. How to show a selected number of products for guests in Magento?

Answer:
To show only to selected products go to the toolbar and you will see:

app/code/core/Mage/Catalog/Block/Product/List/Toolbar.php

Then go to below method:

Public function setCollection($collection);

There you will find the below piece of code:

$limit= (int)$this->get Limit();
If ($limit) {
$this ->_collection->setPageSize($limit);
}

Here in this code, you have to change the variable $limit and you should override that block in a local pool. Do not make changes directly in the core. To check if the customer is a guest please use below:

Mage:: getSingleton('customer/session') -> isLoggedIn()

Q12. What is the difference between Omni channel retailing and multi-channel retailing?

Answer:
Multi-channel retailing provides different platforms for a business like a web, mobile, television, etc. to facilitate the increase in sales of the product.

Omni channel is a step ahead than multi-channel and provides same brand experience in spite of the channel or medium the customer uses.

Q13. How will you add a blog to Magento?

Answer:
To increase your search engine rankings and sales blogs are important. There are two ways to add blogs in Magento:

To use the default Magento blog extension.
Create a custom blog module.

Once this is done install blog extension and configure it.

Q14. What is the difference between pay and capture information?

Answer:
Pay is used when an invoice needs to be set as paid. This is used when payment is online or offline. Capture is used when actual payment processing is online and capture() method is used for payment. Once this done pay() method is called.

Let us move to the last Magento Interview Questions And Answer.

Q15. Explain Magento’s compilation feature.

Answer:
This is the most popular Magento Interview Questions asked in an interview. This feature of Magento helps a user to compile all files to create single include path to enhance the performance. The performance can be increased by 25% to 50%. To use this tool the directory includes the file includes/config.php which should be in write mode.

Quiz Result
Total Questions	Correct Answers	Wrong Answers	Percentage