I applied through an employee referral. The process took 3 weeks. I interviewed at Apple (Santa Clara, CA) in Oct 2008
Interview
The interviewing process at Apple is excrutiatingly slow. However, I heard that once they made up their mind, the offer comes very fast. It took me about 3 weeks from the intial contact with the recruiter to personal interview. No phone calls from the hiring manager, it went straight to on-site interview with 3 different people. A word of advice I got from my contacts at Apple: loose your tie and jacket before the interview. Anything else goes,including T-shirt and blue jeans.
Multiple rounds with a panel of 6-8 people as part of the interview process. Recruiters are slow to get back to you and often will ghost you. Even when an offer is imminent it could take a month or 2.
Straightforward but judgmental from the start.
Dive in and wade the water, and hopefully you get to the next question, and then wade that scenario. Overall great experience and enjoyed the process.
Three step process, incredibly smooth and well informed along the way. The interviewers were clearly engaged and polite, and I had a lot of flexibility with timing. It didn't end up working out for unrelated reasons.