Practise with a friend or with an AI?

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As of 16 September 2026. ChatGPT per OpenAI's "ChatGPT Voice" help page and its Swiss pricing page, both read that day; our details from the practice interview code. "Not stated" means not readable on the vendor's pages.

What you pay

As of 16 September 2026. ChatGPT prices from the rendered page chatgpt.com/de-CH/pricing, speaking time from the "ChatGPT Voice" help page; our allowances from the product constants.

What a friend gives you that an AI cannot

Half of a job interview is a social event. You walk in, shake hands, sit down, someone offers you water, and two minutes go on the train connection before the first real question. Only a person can rehearse that part with you. A friend notices when you look at the ceiling while thinking, fiddle with a pen, or let your voice fade at the end of every sentence. None of the voice AIs on the market is watching you while you talk.

Then there is pressure. Talking about your weaknesses out loud in front of someone you know is uncomfortable, and that discomfort is close to the real thing. Practise only with a machine and you get used to a listener who never frowns. The third strength is industry knowledge. A friend who works in nursing, in a fiduciary office or on a software team will hear when an answer is technically empty, and knows the follow-up a ward manager or a lead developer would actually ask. And it is free, apart from an evening and perhaps dinner as a thank-you.

Where a friend runs out

The biggest problem is kindness. Friends say "that was good" because they like you, not because the answer was. Very few will tell you to your face that your reply to "why are you leaving?" sounds like running away. The second problem is preparation. A friend usually reads questions off a list found online. The questions your specific advert raises, about the one requirement you only half meet, come up only if they have studied the advert first.

The third problem is time: a friend may give you two evenings, not ten attempts at the same answer. The fourth is language, which matters more in Switzerland than almost anywhere. An interview in Lausanne runs in French, and a second round at a Zurich head office may switch to English. Of the adverts in our index that state a language requirement, 31.8% ask for at least two languages (16 September 2026). A friend who shares your first language often cannot run the other one with you. If you are applying from abroad, that friend may also not know how a Swiss interview differs from the one at home.

What an AI does that friends rarely manage

An AI repeats without getting tired of you. You can answer the same question five times, each a little differently, and the fifth piece of feedback is as attentive as the first. It is available when you are: at lunch, on a Sunday night, an hour before the call. And it is not polite in the unhelpful way. A score against fixed criteria tells you the answer was friendly but had no example in it.

In our practice interview, the questions also come from your CV and the advert. You choose the company size (1–5, 5–50, 50–200 or over 200 staff) and up to five roles at the table, for example HR, the future line manager and a specialist. An AI voice asks eight questions one at a time, spread across those roles. Each answer has a visible three-minute countdown. If an answer stays vague, you get at most one short follow-up. After each answer you get a score from 0 to 10, split into substance, structure and fit, with the reasoning and a line on what a strong answer would have included. German practice uses the informal du at small firms and the formal Sie at larger ones, which is how it usually goes in Switzerland.

Where the AI does not help

It cannot see you. Posture, eye contact, clothes and handshake are outside what our practice interview assesses, and OpenAI states that ChatGPT's Live voice has no video. The score is based on the transcript: it judges what you said, not how confident you looked saying it. A hesitation that everyone in the room would notice barely shows up in the text.

It does not know the room either. There is no small talk before the first question, no company presentation, and no moment at the end where you ask your own questions and someone reacts on the spot. A score measures an answer against a rubric; it does not predict whether you get the job. And if people make you nervous but software does not, practising with an AI skips exactly the nerves that matter on the day. For that, a human is the only real option.

ChatGPT voice mode as the third option

ChatGPT talks freely, lets you interrupt, and can hold an open conversation for hours. On the free plan voice is limited with no fixed number; from the Go plan at CHF 7 a month you get three hours per rolling 24 hours. If you just want to speak out loud, it does that well. What it lacks is structure: you paste in the CV and the advert yourself, invent the panel with a prompt, and ask for a score that follows different standards each time.

A free middle route: ask ChatGPT to write ten questions from the advert, then hand the list to your friend. The friend asks the right questions and you still get a human across the table. You will need to ask them outright for blunt feedback, though.

What it costs, worked out honestly

A friend is free, but their time is scarce: plan on one or two rehearsals, not ten. ChatGPT Go is CHF 7 a month with a lot of speaking time and no fixed scoring. Our practice interview starts with one scored answer without an account; a free account needs only an email address, so it works from abroad. The free account then gives 5 answers on sign-up day and 5 a month after that. The subscription is CHF 15 a month with 40 scored answers, or CHF 95 a year with 80 a month, and it includes the CV, the motivation letter and the CV check for the same advert.

For comparison, a paid human, read on the providers' pages on 16 September 2026: coaching-job.ch charges CHF 75 or CHF 90 per 30 minutes, cvpics.ch CHF 230 for a simulation of about 35 minutes plus about 35 minutes of feedback, and laufbahnvision.ch CHF 180 an hour excluding VAT. A coach combines the two things this page separates, a real person and honest feedback. If you are registered with the RAV, the regional employment office, ask before you book whether an application course can be covered.

Combining both in one week

Days one to four: work on content with the AI. Answer the questions for the advert, read the reasoning, rewrite the weak answers and repeat them until substance and structure hold. Spend most of the time on the requirements you do not fully meet and on the salary question. Day five: one rehearsal with a friend, ideally dressed for the interview, at a table, with a greeting at the start and your own questions at the end. Give them three things to watch for, such as: do I get to the point in the first twenty seconds, do I give a concrete example, do I look away when I am unsure?

If you have only a single evening, dispense with the AI altogether and head straight to your friend, but instead of following a standard inquiry schedule, craft a set of questions tailored to the advert. If no one is available to assist, dedicate some time to the AI and record a video of yourself on your phone; this will provide a chance to assess your posture and eye contact from an external perspective at least once.