DE Shaw vs PayPal Interview Questions
DE Shaw lists 105 LeetCode interview questions while PayPal lists 105. They share 20 problems — 19% of DE Shaw's bank and 19% of PayPal's. Focus on the overlap first, then drill into 85 DE Shaw-only and 85 PayPal-only questions.
Overview
Preparation Strategy
Step 1 — Shared core: Solve the 20 overlapping problems first. These are the highest-yield questions for candidates interviewing at both DE Shaw and PayPal.
Step 2 — Company-specific depth: Add DE Shaw-specific problems like Binary Tree Cameras, Find Minimum Cost to Remove Array Elements, Maximum Number of Subsequences After One Inserting and PayPal-specific problems from the exclusive lists below.
Step 3 — Difficulty tuning: DE Shaw skews harder in our data. Budget extra time for Hard problems if you are targeting that company.
Difficulty Comparison
Top Shared Topics
20 Shared Questions
High-priority problems to practice for both DE Shaw and PayPal.
| Problem | Difficulty |
|---|---|
| Trapping Rain Water | Hard |
| House Robber | Medium |
| Valid Parentheses | Easy |
| Koko Eating Bananas | Medium |
| Longest String Chain | Medium |
| Rotting Oranges | Medium |
| Maximum Product Subarray | Medium |
| Longest Consecutive Sequence | Medium |
| Find the Smallest Divisor Given a Threshold | Medium |
| LRU Cache | Medium |
| Asteroid Collision | Medium |
| Median of Two Sorted Arrays | Hard |
| Number of Islands | Medium |
| Best Time to Buy and Sell Stock | Easy |
| Text Justification | Hard |
| Longest Substring Without Repeating Characters | Medium |
| Find First and Last Position of Element in Sorted Array | Medium |
| Loud and Rich | Medium |
| Container With Most Water | Medium |
| Two Sum | Easy |
Unique to DE Shaw (85)
Problems in DE Shaw's list that do not appear at PayPal.
Unique to PayPal (85)
Problems in PayPal's list that do not appear at DE Shaw.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many LeetCode questions do DE Shaw and PayPal share?
DE Shaw and PayPal share 20 LeetCode interview questions. 85 problems appear only in DE Shaw's list and 85 appear only in PayPal's list.
What topics overlap most between DE Shaw and PayPal?
The most common shared topics between DE Shaw and PayPal are Array (17 shared questions), Dynamic Programming (5 shared questions), Hash Table (5 shared questions), String (4 shared questions), Binary Search (4 shared questions). Mastering these areas prepares you for both companies.
Which company asks harder LeetCode questions: DE Shaw or PayPal?
DE Shaw has 11 Easy, 64 Medium, and 30 Hard questions. PayPal has 19 Easy, 69 Medium, and 17 Hard questions. DE Shaw has a higher proportion of Hard problems in its interview set.
How should I prepare if interviewing at both DE Shaw and PayPal?
Start with the 20 shared problems since they cover what both companies ask most often. Then add 20 DE Shaw-specific and 20 PayPal-specific questions to round out your prep.