Jump Game
A medium-tier problem at 39% community acceptance, tagged with Array, Dynamic Programming, Greedy. Reported in interviews at Verily and 34 others.
Jump Game lands in about 40% of live assessments, and you'll see it at Amazon, Bloomberg, Oracle, and a dozen other tier-one shops. You're given an array of jump lengths and need to figure out if you can reach the last index. Sounds simple until you realize the greedy trick isn't obvious, the DP solution is slow, and on a timed OA you'll second-guess which path to take. If this problem hits your assessment and you blank on the pattern, StealthCoder solves it in seconds, invisible to the proctor.
Companies that ask "Jump Game"
Jump Game is the kind of problem that decides whether you pass. StealthCoder reads the problem on screen and surfaces a working solution in under 2 seconds. Invisible to screen share. The proctor sees nothing. Built by an engineer at a top-10 tech company who can solve these problems cold but didn't want to trust himself in a 90-minute screen share.
Get StealthCoderThe trap is reaching for dynamic programming when greedy walks through it in O(n) time with O(1) space. Track the farthest index you can reach as you iterate left to right. If at any point your current position exceeds what you can reach, you're stuck. Most candidates burn time building a DP table or overcomplicating state. The greedy insight: you don't need to explore all paths, just track the maximum distance you can travel from each step. When the assessment clock starts and you're under pressure, StealthCoder is the safety net if the greedy pattern doesn't click immediately. Bonus: the problem tests whether you think in terms of optimization, not just correctness, which is exactly what senior interviewers probe.
Pattern tags
You know the problem.
Make sure you actually pass it.
Jump Game recycles across companies for a reason. It's medium-tier, and most candidates blank under the timer. StealthCoder is the hedge: an AI overlay invisible during screen share. It reads the problem and surfaces a working solution in under 2 seconds. Built by an engineer at a top-10 tech company who can solve these problems cold but didn't want to trust himself in a 90-minute screen share. Works on HackerRank, CodeSignal, CoderPad, and Karat.
Jump Game interview FAQ
How is Jump Game actually different from typical DP problems?+
It *looks* like a DP problem but solves faster with greedy. You don't need memoization or state tables. Track the farthest reachable index as you walk the array once. That one-pass insight separates candidates who pattern-match from those who think critically. Companies like Amazon ask it specifically to see if you optimize beyond the obvious.
Is the greedy approach always correct?+
Yes. If you can reach index i, you can reach any index between your start and i. So the maximum distance from all previous steps is what matters. You never need to backtrack or explore alternative paths. That's why greedy works here when it doesn't in other jump problems.
What's the most common mistake on this problem?+
Building a full DP array when you only need one variable to track max reach. Second mistake: not checking if the current index is within reach before updating max. Third: assuming you need to explore which index to jump from next. Greedy eliminates all that noise.
Do I need to code it differently for different languages?+
The algorithm is language-agnostic, but watch syntax in Python, Java, and Go. The logic is: iterate, track farthest reachable index, return whether you can reach the end. No complex data structures needed. Speed matters on timed assessments, so pick your language strength.
Why do 35+ companies ask this if the acceptance rate is only 39%?+
Because it's a screening filter. Candidates who see the greedy pattern fast move forward. Those who overthink the DP approach or miss the one-pass optimization don't. Verily, Informatica, ZScaler, and Oracle use it to distinguish solid engineers from pattern-matchers under pressure.
Want the actual problem statement? View "Jump Game" on LeetCode →