Recently, our team just wrapped up guiding some students through the TikTok OA. It was a tough one – three multiple-choice and two hard programming questions. I’m dropping the actual questions here foryou all. Seriously helpful stuff if you’re prepping for it!
Multiple-choice Questions
Question 1
The string S is initially empty. You may perform the following any number of times:
- Append any character to
Sfor a cost of 5 points. - Copy any substring of
Sthat ends at the current rightmost character and append it toSfor a cost of 5 points.
What is the minimum cost to construct the string “abhibhibhi”?
Pick one option:
- 35
- 30
- 25
- 20
Question 2
“When the Brodie helmet was introduced during WWI, there was a dramatic rise in field hospital admissions of severe head injury victims.This led army command to consider redesigning until a statistician pointed out that soldiers who might previously have been killed by certain shrapnelhits (and therefore never showed up) were now surviving and showing up in hospitals.”
Which type of statistical bias is illustrated here?
Pick one option:
- Sampling Bias
- Confirmation Bias
- Survivorship Bias
- Susceptibility Bias
Question 3
For a right-skewed (positively skewed) distribution, which statements are correct? (Pick one or more.)
- The mean is greater than the mode.
- The mean is less than the mode.
- The mean is greater than the median.
- The mean is less than the median.
Coding
Coding 1
Given an initial parenthesis sequence s, plus a toolkit of parentheses kitParentheses with efficiency ratings efficiencyRatings, add zero or more parentheses to s to make it balanced and maximize the total efficiency rating.
Definition: A balanced sequence has properly paired parentheses in the correct order. Efficiency is the sum of ratings of the added parentheses.
Input:
s: initial sequence.kitParentheses: available parentheses.efficiencyRatings: matching ratings array.
Output: maximum achievable efficiency rating.
Coding 2
Given n points where point i has weight weight[i] and starts at position i. Each operation can move point i right by dist[i] units. Sort the points by weight with the minimum number of operations.
Input:
n: number of points.weight: array of weights.dist: array of move distances.
Output: minimum number of operations required.
Example:
n = 4
weight = [3, 6, 5, 1]
dist = [4, 3, 2, 1]
Output: 5
That wraps up the TikTok OA breakdown. Hope these questions and tips give you a head start. Keep practicing, stay confident, and you’ve got this.
Need help with OA tasks or interview prep? ProgramHelp offers tailored support—from OA assistance to 1-on-1 coaching—to help you prep smarter and land that offer faster. Reach outanytime!
