Shortest Subarray to be Removed to Make Array Sorted
A medium-tier problem at 51% community acceptance, tagged with Array, Two Pointers, Binary Search. Reported in interviews at razorpay and 1 others.
You need to find the shortest contiguous subarray to remove so the remaining elements are sorted. Razorpay and DE Shaw have both asked this. It feels like a sorting problem at first, but the trick is that you're not rearranging anything. You're looking for the shortest window to delete, which means you need to find the longest valid structure on the left and right sides that don't need to go. Most candidates miss this and waste time on a greedy approach that doesn't work. If this problem shows up in your live OA and you blank on the pattern, StealthCoder solves it invisibly.
Companies that ask "Shortest Subarray to be Removed to Make Array Sorted"
Shortest Subarray to be Removed to Make Array Sorted 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. Made by a working Amazon engineer who got tired of watching qualified friends bomb OAs they'd solve cold in an IDE.
Get StealthCoderThe key insight is that if you remove a subarray from index i to j, the array stays sorted if arr[0..i-1] is sorted, arr[j+1..n-1] is sorted, and arr[i-1] <= arr[j+1]. So you're hunting for the smallest window [i, j] where this holds. The brute force is O(n^3), but you can optimize with two pointers or binary search on the right boundary for each left position. A monotonic stack approach also works by tracking indices of elements in increasing order. The trap is assuming the answer is always the left or right tail. It's not. You must consider all valid split points. This is exactly the kind of problem where the pattern matters more than raw coding speed. StealthCoder is the hedge if the monotonic stack idea doesn't click during the timed assessment.
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Shortest Subarray to be Removed to Make Array Sorted 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. Made by a working Amazon engineer who got tired of watching qualified friends bomb OAs they'd solve cold in an IDE. Works on HackerRank, CodeSignal, CoderPad, and Karat.
Shortest Subarray to be Removed to Make Array Sorted interview FAQ
Is this problem really about removing subarrays or is there a sorting trick?+
It's about removal, not rearrangement. The trick is that you're finding the shortest contiguous window to delete such that what remains is already sorted. No sorting algorithm involved. Think of it as finding the longest valid prefix and suffix, then the gap between them is your answer.
Do Razorpay and DE Shaw still ask this one, or is it outdated?+
Both companies are still on the report. It's an intermediate problem, not a soft-serve warm-up. Expect it to show up in online assessments for infrastructure and finance engineering roles, especially in India-based hiring.
What's the most common wrong approach?+
Greedy left-to-right scanning. Candidates assume the answer is always 'remove everything from here to the end', but the optimal window might be in the middle or at a different boundary. Two pointers or binary search is more reliable than a single-pass heuristic.
How does Two Pointers connect to the monotonic stack approach?+
Two pointers finds valid left and right boundaries directly. Monotonic stack builds up indices in sorted order, letting you query valid split points faster. Both work, but stack is trickier to implement correctly under time pressure during an OA.
With a 51% acceptance rate, how hard is this really?+
Medium difficulty and above-average rejection rate mean the pattern isn't obvious and edge cases bite hard. The straightforward O(n^2) or O(n^3) solution works but times out. You need the optimized insight to pass, which is why this one stings if you haven't drilled it.
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