Problem database last updated: June 20, 2025

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Tesla Coding Interview Questions

43 problems · 13 Easy, 25 Medium, 5 Hard · Ranked #50 of 458

Difficulty breakdown

13 Easy

30% · avg 23%

25 Medium

58% · avg 59%

5 Hard

12% · avg 18%

Top topics

array
48.8%
string
37.2%
hash-table
34.9%1.6x
sorting
18.6%
stack
14%1.6x
two-pointers
14%

Interview profile

Based on 43 reported problems, Tesla interviews are in line with industry averages - 12% Hard vs 18% overall. The majority (58%) of questions are Medium difficulty, which is typical for companies that want to see solid fundamentals without excessive trick questions.

Compared to the industry average, Tesla puts unusual emphasis on queue (4.7% of problems, 3.2x the industry average), counting (7% of problems, 2.1x the industry average), divide-and-conquer (7% of problems, 1.7x the industry average). If you're short on time, these are the categories to double down on.

The most common topics are array (48.8%), string (37.2%), hash-table (34.9%), sorting (18.6%). Problems below are sorted by frequency, the ones at the top are asked most often.

All 43 problems

Longest Substring Without Repeating Characters

Solve

Given a string s, find the length of the longest substring without duplicate characters.

MediumVery Likely
hash-tablestringsliding-window

Minimum Changes To Make Alternating Binary String

Solve

You are given a string s consisting only of the characters '0' and '1'. In one operation, you can change any '0' to '1' or vice versa.

EasyVery Likely
string

Find Followers Count

Solve

Table: Followers

EasyVery Likely
database

Basic Calculator II

Solve

Given a string s which represents an expression, evaluate this expression and return its value.

MediumVery Likely
mathstringstack

Merge Intervals

Solve

Given an array of intervals where intervals[i] = [starti, endi], merge all overlapping intervals, and return an array of the non-overlapping intervals that cove...

MediumVery Likely
arraysorting

Number of Islands

Solve

Given an m x n 2D binary grid grid which represents a map of '1's (land) and '0's (water), return the number of islands.

MediumVery Likely
arraydepth-first-searchbreadth-first-search

Design Circular Queue

Solve

Design your implementation of the circular queue. The circular queue is a linear data structure in which the operations are performed based on FIFO (First In Fi...

MediumVery Likely
arraylinked-listdesign

Building H2O

Solve

There are two kinds of threads: oxygen and hydrogen. Your goal is to group these threads to form water molecules.

MediumVery Likely
concurrency

Letter Combinations of a Phone Number

Solve

Given a string containing digits from 2-9 inclusive, return all possible letter combinations that the number could represent. Return the answer in any order.

MediumVery Likely
hash-tablestringbacktracking

Top K Frequent Elements

Solve

Given an integer array nums and an integer k, return the k most frequent elements. You may return the answer in any order.

MediumVery Likely
arrayhash-tabledivide-and-conquer

Valid Parentheses

Solve

Given a string s containing just the characters '(', ')', '{', '}', '[' and ']', determine if the input string is valid.

EasyVery Likely
stringstack

Container With Most Water

Solve

You are given an integer array height of length n. There are n vertical lines drawn such that the two endpoints of the ith line are (i, 0) and (i, height[i]).

MediumVery Likely
arraytwo-pointersgreedy

LRU Cache

Solve

Design a data structure that follows the constraints of a Least Recently Used (LRU) cache.

MediumVery Likely
hash-tablelinked-listdesign

Best Time to Buy and Sell Stock

Solve

You are given an array prices where prices[i] is the price of a given stock on the ith day.

EasyVery Likely
arraydynamic-programming

Subarray Sum Equals K

Solve

Given an array of integers nums and an integer k, return the total number of subarrays whose sum equals to k.

MediumLikely
arrayhash-tableprefix-sum

Decode the Message

Solve

You are given the strings key and message, which represent a cipher key and a secret message, respectively. The steps to decode message are as follows:

EasyLikely
hash-tablestring

Maximum Number of Balloons

Solve

Given a string text, you want to use the characters of text to form as many instances of the word "balloon" as possible.

EasyLikely
hash-tablestringcounting

3Sum

Solve

Given an integer array nums, return all the triplets [nums[i], nums[j], nums[k]] such that i != j, i != k, and j != k, and nums[i] + nums[j] + nums[k] == 0.

MediumLikely
arraytwo-pointerssorting

Reverse Nodes in k-Group

Solve

Given the head of a linked list, reverse the nodes of the list k at a time, and return the modified list.

HardLikely
linked-listrecursion

Move Zeroes

Solve

Given an integer array nums, move all 0's to the end of it while maintaining the relative order of the non-zero elements.

EasyLikely
arraytwo-pointers

Valid Anagram

Solve

Given two strings s and t, return true if t is an anagram of s, and false otherwise.

EasyLikely
hash-tablestringsorting

Maximum Subarray

Solve

Given an integer array nums, find the subarray with the largest sum, and return its sum.

MediumLikely
arraydivide-and-conquerdynamic-programming

Max Area of Island

Solve

You are given an m x n binary matrix grid. An island is a group of 1's (representing land) connected 4-directionally (horizontal or vertical.) You may assume al...

MediumLikely
arraydepth-first-searchbreadth-first-search

Reorganize String

Solve

Given a string s, rearrange the characters of s so that any two adjacent characters are not the same.

MediumLikely
hash-tablestringgreedy

Largest Perimeter Triangle

Solve

Given an integer array nums, return the largest perimeter of a triangle with a non-zero area, formed from three of these lengths. If it is impossible to form an...

EasyLikely
arraymathgreedy

Missing Number

Solve

Given an array nums containing n distinct numbers in the range [0, n], return the only number in the range that is missing from the array.

EasyLikely
arrayhash-tablemath

Longest Palindromic Substring

Solve

Given a string s, return the longest palindromic substring in s.

MediumLikely
two-pointersstringdynamic-programming

House Robber

Solve

You are a professional robber planning to rob houses along a street. Each house has a certain amount of money stashed, the only constraint stopping you from rob...

MediumLikely
arraydynamic-programming

Reverse Linked List

Solve

Given the head of a singly linked list, reverse the list, and return the reversed list.

EasyLikely
linked-listrecursion

Is Subsequence

Solve

Given two strings s and t, return true if s is a subsequence of t, or false otherwise.

EasyLikely
two-pointersstringdynamic-programming

Group Anagrams

Solve

Given an array of strings strs, group the anagrams together. You can return the answer in any order.

MediumLikely
arrayhash-tablestring

Trapping Rain Water

Solve

Given n non-negative integers representing an elevation map where the width of each bar is 1, compute how much water it can trap after raining.

HardLikely
arraytwo-pointersdynamic-programming

Construct Binary Tree from Preorder and Inorder Traversal

Solve

Given two integer arrays preorder and inorder where preorder is the preorder traversal of a binary tree and inorder is the inorder traversal of the same tree, c...

MediumLikely
arrayhash-tabledivide-and-conquer

Combination Sum II

Solve

Given a collection of candidate numbers (candidates) and a target number (target), find all unique combinations in candidates where the candidate numbers sum to...

MediumLikely
arraybacktracking

First Missing Positive

Solve

Given an unsorted integer array nums. Return the smallest positive integer that is not present in nums.

HardLikely
arrayhash-table

Simplify Path

Solve

You are given an absolute path for a Unix-style file system, which always begins with a slash '/'. Your task is to transform this absolute path into its simplif...

MediumLikely
stringstack

Flatten Nested List Iterator

Solve

You are given a nested list of integers nestedList. Each element is either an integer or a list whose elements may also be integers or other lists. Implement an...

MediumLikely
stacktreedepth-first-search

Course Schedule II

Solve

There are a total of numCourses courses you have to take, labeled from 0 to numCourses - 1. You are given an array prerequisites where prerequisites[i] = [ai, b...

MediumLikely
depth-first-searchbreadth-first-searchgraph

Basic Calculator

Solve

Given a string s representing a valid expression, implement a basic calculator to evaluate it, and return the result of the evaluation.

HardLikely
mathstringstack

Find Minimum in Rotated Sorted Array

Solve

Suppose an array of length n sorted in ascending order is rotated between 1 and n times. For example, the array nums = [0,1,2,4,5,6,7] might become:

MediumLikely
arraybinary-search

Serialize and Deserialize Binary Tree

Solve

Serialization is the process of converting a data structure or object into a sequence of bits so that it can be stored in a file or memory buffer, or transmitte...

HardLikely
stringtreedepth-first-search

Repeated DNA Sequences

Solve

The DNA sequence is composed of a series of nucleotides abbreviated as 'A', 'C', 'G', and 'T'.

MediumLikely
hash-tablestringbit-manipulation

Find Winner on a Tic Tac Toe Game

Solve

Tic-tac-toe is played by two players A and B on a 3 x 3 grid. The rules of Tic-Tac-Toe are:

EasyLikely
arrayhash-tablematrix

How often are these problems asked?

Frequency scores are based on crowdsourced interview reports. A higher score means the problem has been reported more often in recent Tesla interviews.

Very Likely

75-100%

Likely

50-74%

Sometimes

25-49%

Rare

0-24%

Preparing for your Tesla coding interview

Tesla interviews focus heavily on array, string, hash-table problems. If you're short on time, these are the categories to prioritize. The problems on this page are sorted by frequency, so start from the top and work your way down.

Beyond solving problems, practice explaining your approach. Tesla interviewers care about your thought process - how you break down a problem, consider edge cases, and evaluate tradeoffs between solutions. A clean O(n) solution you can explain clearly beats an O(log n) solution you can't articulate.

Looking for more companies? Browse all 458 companies in our directory, or sharpen your fundamentals with our free data structure visualizers and AI-powered DSA tutor.

Frequently Asked Questions

What coding problems does Tesla ask in interviews?add

Tesla has been reported to ask 43 distinct coding problems. The most common topics are array, string, hash-table. 13 are Easy difficulty, 25 are Medium, and 5 are Hard. Problems are sorted by frequency - the ones at the top are asked most often.

How hard are Tesla coding interviews?add

Based on 43 reported problems, Tesla interviews are in line with industry averages - 12% Hard vs 18% overall. 58% of questions are Medium difficulty. Focus on the high-frequency Medium problems first, then work through the Hard ones.

How should I prepare for a Tesla coding interview?add

Start with the highest-frequency problems listed on this page. Focus on the core topics: array, string, hash-table. Practice solving them under time pressure and explaining your approach out loud. Mock interviews with AI can simulate the real experience.

Other companies to explore

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