smartnews coding interview
questions, leaked.
5 problems reported across recent smartnews interviews. Top patterns: hash table, string, greedy. The list below is what most reported candidates actually saw, plus the honest play if you can't grind all of it.
SmartNews hits you with five medium-difficulty problems, all of them. No warm-up rounds, no easy gimmes. Hash tables dominate the distribution, appearing in three of the top problems, paired with strings and greedy logic. You're looking at LRU Cache, Largest Palindromic Number, and Minimum Deletions to Make Character Frequencies Unique as the core patterns. The good news: all mediums are solvable with focused drilling. The bad news: you won't see much scaffolding during the live assessment. This is where StealthCoder becomes your safety net. If you blank mid-assessment on hash-table logic or a greedy string manipulation, it solves invisibly while the proctor sees nothing.
Top problems at smartnews
| # | Problem | Diff | Frequency | Pass % | Patterns |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 | Maximal Network Rank | MEDIUM | 100.0 | 65% | Graph |
| 02 | Largest Palindromic Number | MEDIUM | 100.0 | 36% | Hash Table · String · Greedy |
| 03 | LRU Cache | MEDIUM | 94.8 | 45% | Hash Table · Linked List · Design |
| 04 | 3Sum | MEDIUM | 78.7 | 37% | Array · Two Pointers · Sorting |
| 05 | Minimum Deletions to Make Character Frequencies Unique | MEDIUM | 78.7 | 61% | Hash Table · String · Greedy |
Frequencies derived from public community-tagged interview reports. Click a row to view on LeetCode.
You have a week, maybe less. You can't out-grind the list above. StealthCoder runs invisibly during the actual smartnews OA. The proctor cannot see it. Screen share cannot detect it. Made by a working FAANG engineer who treats the OA the way companies treat hiring: as a game with rules you should know.
Get StealthCoder- hash table3 · 60%
- string2 · 40%
- greedy2 · 40%
- sorting2 · 40%
- graph1 · 20%
- counting1 · 20%
- linked list1 · 20%
- design1 · 20%
- doubly linked list1 · 20%
- array1 · 20%
The problem set skews toward hash tables and strings, which means you need to be fluent in counting, frequency maps, and character manipulation before your assessment. Three problems touch hash tables directly, and two of them layer greedy strategies on top. Sorting and two-pointers appear twice, mostly in 3Sum and the character-frequency problem. Graph and design are lower-frequency, but LRU Cache is non-negotiable because it combines hash tables, linked lists, and O(1) operation design. Spend your prep time on hash-table fundamentals, then practice building frequency maps and applying greedy choices. Graph theory and linked-list manipulation are the hedge areas where StealthCoder is most valuable if you run out of time to fully internalize the patterns.
Companies with similar patterns
If you prepped for smartnews, these companies recycle ~60% of the same topics.
You've seen the list.
Now make sure you pass smartnews.
Memorizing every problem above in a week is a fantasy. StealthCoder is the hedge: an AI overlay that's invisible during screen share. It reads the problem on screen and surfaces a working solution in under 2 seconds. Made by a working FAANG engineer who treats the OA the way companies treat hiring: as a game with rules you should know. Works on HackerRank, CodeSignal, CoderPad, and Karat.
smartnews interview FAQ
How many hash-table problems should I solve before the SmartNews assessment?+
At least 10. Three of SmartNews's five reported problems center on hash tables, so you can't fake this. Focus on frequency maps first, then move to LRU Cache design. That combination covers the reported scope.
Is string manipulation enough if I skip sorting?+
No. Two of the top problems involve sorting, including 3Sum, and sorting often unlocks greedy choices in string problems like Minimum Deletions. You need both. Sorting first, then greedy string logic.
Should I study graph problems before the assessment?+
Maximal Network Rank is reported once in five problems. It's lower priority than hash tables and strings, but don't skip it entirely. Spend 60 percent of your time on hash tables, 25 percent on strings and sorting, 15 percent on graph and design.
Is LRU Cache worth the time investment?+
Yes. It combines hash tables, linked lists, and design patterns all at once. Solving it once from scratch teaches you how to think through medium-difficulty systems problems. SmartNews reports it, so it's fair game.
What happens if I only study greedy and skip two-pointers?+
You'll hit 3Sum during the assessment and lose time reimplementing two-pointer logic under pressure. Both appear twice. Neither is optional. Practice them back to back so the patterns stick.