Twenty years ago this article would have been one sentence: wear a suit. Today the honest answer is "it depends", which is far less comforting when you are staring at your wardrobe the night before an interview. A suit at a tech startup can read as badly as jeans at a law firm. The dress codes have fractured, and the cost of misjudging them, in your own comfort as much as their perception, is real.
The reassuring truth underneath the confusion: interviewers rarely hire or reject anyone for clothing, but clothing changes how you feel and how the first minute lands. Get it roughly right and it disappears as a factor, which is exactly what you want. This guide covers how to work out the real dress code, what to wear at each level of formality, and the extra considerations when the interview happens through a camera.
The one rule that survives: one notch above
Across nearly every industry and level, the safest principle is to dress one notch more formally than the people who work there daily. It signals effort and respect without costume-level overdressing. If the team wears jeans and t-shirts, you wear chinos and a smart shirt or knit. If the team wears business casual, you add a blazer. If the team wears suits, you wear your best one.
One notch, not three. Arriving in a three-piece suit at a company where the CEO wears trainers does not read as respect; it reads as not having done your research, and it will make you the most uncomfortable person in the room.
Finding the real dress code
You cannot apply "one notch above" without knowing the baseline, so treat the dress code as a small research task:
- Company photos and social media. Look at the team's own posts, careers pages, and event photos, not the stock photography on the homepage. Photos of actual employees on an actual Tuesday are the evidence you want.
- LinkedIn. Profile photos and posted office photos from people in the team you would join.
- Ask directly. If a recruiter or HR coordinator is arranging the interview, "what's the dress code like in the office?" is a completely normal question that no one has ever been penalised for asking.
- Industry defaults. When evidence is thin, sectors have baselines: law, banking, and much of professional services still default to suits; the public sector and established corporates sit at business casual; startups and creative agencies sit at smart casual or below.
This sits naturally inside your broader preparation. If you are already researching the company for values and recent news, note what people are wearing in the photos while you are there.
What each level looks like
Formal business
Suit in a dark, plain colour, plain shirt, polished shoes. A tie remains standard for the most traditional environments (law, banking, some client-facing consulting) and optional almost everywhere else. Keep accessories quiet and make sure the suit actually fits; an ill-fitting suit undermines the formality it is supposed to project.
Business casual
Tailored trousers or a skirt, a shirt, blouse, or fine knit, and a blazer or structured jacket. Leather shoes or clean, plain equivalents. This is the broad safe middle for most office roles in most industries, and if you genuinely cannot find any evidence about an employer, business casual with a blazer is the least risky guess: you can remove a blazer, but you cannot conjure one.
Smart casual
Chinos or dark, unripped jeans, a plain shirt, polo, or good-quality knit, clean and unscuffed shoes or minimal trainers. This is the right level for many startups and creative studios, where the aim is "put-together version of what the team wears". Even here, avoid slogan t-shirts, shorts, and anything you would wear to the gym.
The rules that apply at every level
- Clean, ironed, and fitting matter more than expensive. A pressed £30 shirt beats a crumpled £100 one every time an interviewer looks at you.
- Comfort is a performance issue. If you are tugging at a collar or hobbling in new shoes, some of your attention is going to your clothes instead of the questions. Wear the outfit for an evening before the interview, never for the first time on the day.
- Grooming does the quiet work. Tidy hair, trimmed nails, subtle fragrance (interview rooms are small), and nothing distracting.
- Weather-proof the plan. A soaked candidate in the right outfit is still a soaked candidate. Check the forecast and leave margin.
- Prepare the outfit the night before. Decision-making on interview morning should be zero. Lay everything out, checked and ready.
Dressing for video interviews
Video interviews keep every rule above and add optics. A camera is not a mirror: it compresses, it flickers, and it crops you at the chest, which changes what works.
- Same research, same level. Being at home is not a dress-code discount. Dress exactly as you would for the in-person version, top and bottom: you may need to stand up mid-call, and being properly dressed changes how you carry yourself even when it is never seen.
- Solid mid-tone colours win on camera. Fine stripes, small checks, and busy patterns can shimmer and strobe on webcams. Pure white blows out under window light, and all black swallows definition. Plain mid-blues, greens, burgundy, and mid-greys read cleanly.
- Contrast with your background. A white shirt against a white wall turns you into a floating head. Check the actual frame in advance and adjust either the outfit or the background.
- Minimal noise. Dangling earrings and stacked bracelets are amplified by microphones and draw the eye on a small screen. Keep jewellery simple.
- Glasses and glare. If you wear glasses, check for lamp and screen reflections in a test call; moving the light source usually fixes it.
- Do a recorded test. The single most useful step: record ten seconds on the same camera, in the same seat, at the same time of day as the interview, and look at yourself as the interviewer will. Outfit, lighting, framing, and background all get judged in one glance.
Clothing is only one part of how you come across on camera; framing, eye contact, and lighting carry at least as much weight. Our guide to camera presence for interviews covers the full setup.
When you get it wrong anyway
Sometimes you arrive and the calibration is off: everyone is more formal, or far less, than you guessed. Do not mention it repeatedly or apologise for it; one light line at most ("I see I've overdressed for the occasion") and then let it go. Composure about a small misjudgement says more than the misjudgement does. Interviewers forget an off-target outfit within minutes; they remember a candidate who was visibly rattled by it.
The outfit is the easy part
Getting the outfit right buys you something specific: one less thing occupying your head in the opening minute. What fills the rest of the interview is preparation of a different kind. AI Career Mentor gives you realistic practice interviews with feedback on your actual answers, so the confidence you project on the day runs deeper than the blazer.
Key takeaways
- Dress one notch above the company's daily dress code, and research that baseline through team photos, LinkedIn, or simply asking the recruiter.
- When evidence is thin, business casual with a blazer is the least risky default; you can always remove the blazer.
- Fit, cleanliness, and comfort beat expense; wear the outfit once before the day and lay it out the night before.
- On video, dress to the same standard, favour solid mid-tone colours, check contrast against your background, and do a recorded test in the real setup.
- If you misjudge it, one light remark at most, then move on; composure outlasts the outfit.