5 Coding Interview Books to prepare for Programming Job interviews in 2024
Hello guys, If you are preparing for Programming Job interviews and looking for some of the best books for programming questions, then you have come to the right place.
In this article, I am going to share a couple of good books to prepare coding, software design, and data structure algorithm questions, which are essential for any coding interviews.
Though a programming interview also explores other areas of software development, like, the programming language, you would be mainly used in your project, like, Python, JavaScript, C++, or Java.
The database and SQL-based questions, the operating systems, and UNIX-related questions, some of the software design and object-oriented design pattern questions, and much more, but coding-based questions form the core of programming interviews.
This article solely contains books for coding interviews, but if you are interested in finding good books on other topics, like concurrent programming or Java and other topics, then just look at those links and some more I have shared at the end of this article.
6 Best Books for Programming or Coding Interviews in 2024
This is the second article in the series of must-read books for preparing programming job interviews. In the first article, I have shared books, especially for Java interviews, but after receiving lots of good feedback and request about general programming interview books, I decided to write this article.
I have also not included 10, 15, or 20 books on this list as it would be challenging to consult or refer to too many books. Instead, I always like to have a core group of 3 to 4 best books on a topic; hence, I am only sharing 5 books on Programming/Coding interviews.
1. Cracking the Coding Interview
This is your general-purpose coding interview book. Gayle Laakmann McDowell has shared his insights on programming interviews and what tech companies like Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Facebook, Twitter, or Apple look on the candidate when they hire Programmers.
These books give essential basic knowledge by covering all crucial topics of programming interviews, like Data structure, algorithms, SQL, Java, Networking, Database, Operating systems, and a general guide of how to prepare code interviews.
This book is also a massive collection of common programming questions, which is the most important reason I recommend it.
Here is the link to buy this book — Cracking the Coding Interview
If you want, you can also combine this book with Stephen Grider’s The Coding Interview Bootcamp: Algorithms + Data Structures course, which contains basic questions more suitable for the face-to-face round of interviews.
2. System Design Interview Part 1 and 2 By Alex Xu
System design interview is an integral part of coding interviews and this book help you to prepare how to answer System design questions like How do you design YouTube, how NetFlix works, how are you going to design a Rate limiter and so on.
This book is created by Alex Xu who have worked on FAANG companies and fortunate enough to be on the both side of the table, I mean not just he cleared FAANG interview but also taken interviews for them.
In this System design interview book, you will get access to a number of drawings and diagrams that will assist you in gaining an understanding of the real system. You will be able to understand what the recruiters are looking for in your answers to questions.
Alex also have a companion System design course on ByteByteGo, where you will not only find all the content of this book and the second part of System Design Interview Book by Alex Wu but also new content, deep dive into popular system questions like how to design YouTube and WhatsApp as well as proven System design framework to solve Software design problem.
In short, one of the must read book before any coding or tech interview. This is also one of the most recommend System design books on Reddit, Quora, HackerNews, Twitter, and other online platforms and its obvious from the number of reviews this book have on Amazon.
Here is the link to buy this book — System Design Interview Part 1 and 2
3. The Algorithm Design Manual
This is another excellent book to prepare the algorithm design. The Algorithm design manual is written by Steven S. Skiena and is also one of the famous algorithms design books too. The only problem is it’s hard to read and follow.
If you are like many programmers who find it hard to read books with a lot of theory, then I recommend starting with interview questions and referring to this book when encountering algorithmic concepts. This way, you won’t be bored by just reading the theory, and you will also learn the key algorithms.
Though, if you have forgotten fundamental data structure and algorithms which were taught to us in computer science classes, then I strongly suggest you first go to a revision course like Algorithms and Data Structures — Part 1 and 2 courses on Pluralsight to quickly get up-to-speed.
Otherwise, you will have to do a lot of back-and-forths while solving problems from this book.
4. Elements of Programming Interviews
This is one of the excellent books on Programming interviews by Adnan Aziz, Tsung-Hsien Lee, Amit Prakash, who have already authored a couple of books like Algorithm for Interviews, which is aimed to prepare programmers for the most robust programming job interviews with the likes of Apple, Uber, Google, Microsoft, and Amazon.
This book covers all the essential topics a programmer needs to go through to pass the coding interview like Data Structure, Algorithms, Dynamic Programming, Bit Manipulation, etc
Here is the link to buy this book — Elements of Programming Interviews
In short, this is one of the best books to prepare for onsite, face-to-face coding interviews, which might require you to code on the whiteboard. If you need a course to go along with this book take a look at the JavaScript Algorithms and Data Structures Masterclass course by Colt_Steele son Udemy.
5. Programming Interviews Exposed
This is the book I first read on the topic of a software engineer or IT interview. It’s so good that I can’t refrain from recommending this one, the only problem is it’s necessary for experienced programmers, but if you want to read your first programming interview book, this should be the one.
It explains in detail how to solve a problem with the pros and cons of different approaches and also covers essential topics for Programming job interviews, like puzzles, string, array, coding, algorithms, binary trees, networking, computer science, etc.
Here is the link to buy this book —Programming Interviews Exposed
And, if you ask me for an online course to complement this book, I would highly recommend Andrei Neagoie’s Master the Coding Interview: Data Structures + Algorithms book on ZTM Academy, his own online course portal.
Btw, you would need a ZTM membership to watch this course which costs around $39 per month but also provides access to many super engaging and useful courses like his Python course and this JavaScript course.
If you are a constant learner like me then I suggest you go for the annual membership than buying a single course, you will not only save money but also it makes learning easy, as you don’t need to buy courses every time you want to learn something new.
6. Programming Pearls
This is one of the best books to prepare for coding interviews. The Programming Pearls (2nd Edition) by Jon Bentley focuses on problem solving, algorithm design, correctness, and performance. The book is old but still worth reading, and it will prepare you well for any type of programming interview.
Some of the questions discussed in this book are simply an excellent resource for programming interviews. Don’t believe you can decide yourself:
Find all sets of anagrams in the given dictionary.
How to sort 10 million unique non-negative integers, all of which are less than 107 in 1.25M memory?
The question doesn’t end here; you have follow-ups like, What if we have only 1M (or less) memory available? What if our integers are not unique, but the number of occurrences of each value is limited?
Here is the link to buy this book — Programming Pearls
By the way, good knowledge of computer fundamentals like Data Structure and Algorithms are required to answer this questions, If you need a refresher, I also suggest you join Data Structures and Algorithms: Deep Dive Using Java course on Udemy, one of the best course on algorithms.
Let’s see one more interesting questions from this book:
You have a file with 4 billion 32-bit integers. Find an integer that is not in the file.
With follow-ups like How would you do it if you have an ample amount of RAM? What about the case when you have only a few hundred bytes of RAM but are allowed to write temporary files?
This book also has a sequel called More Programming Pearls: Confessions of a Coder, but that’s not really about programming interviews or algorithm design, nevertheless a good read for any programmer.
7. Grokking the SQL Interview
SQL and Database is an essential part of coding interviews hence you also need to prepare SQL related questions not just coding problems but also how to solve SQL queries and database related questions from other topics like indexes, joins, group by, aggregation, and window functions etc
This book contains frequently asked SQL questions from essential topics like
1. SQL Commands
2. Joins in SQL
3. SQL Query Questions
4. Indexes
5. Group by and Aggregation
6. SQL Date and Time Questions
7. Stored Procedures
8. Triggers and Views
9. Transactions
10. Window Function and CTE
11. Deep Dive on popular SQL Questions
If you are preparing for SQL interviews then I highly recommend you to go through these questions before your telephonic or face-to-face interviews, you will not only gain confidence and knowledge to answer the question but also learn how to drive Coding interviews in your favor.
This book is one of the specially designed book to prepare you for SQL interviews by answering popular questions. You an also use discount code friends20 to get 20% discount now.
8. Algo monster
This is not a book but a very useful resource to prepare for a coding interview that I come across recently. This website is specially created to prepare and get succeed in FAANG interviews.
It doesn’t teach you how to solve a particular coding problem but how to find the underlying pattern which can then be used to solve many more coding problems.
Apart from reading one of these books, you can also join Algomoster to get a boost to your coding interview preparation. You will learn the most important patterns and get results in the shortest amount of time possible.
It contains more than 48 Coding Patterns, meticulously Curated by Google Engineers, and more than 325 Lessons and Problems, 678 Illustrations along with Object-Oriented Design and System Design questions to make yourself completely ready for your next coding interview.
You can subscribe to Algomonster now for just $99 (69% discount) and give your interview preparation a new edge. Here is also a nice diagram from Algomoster which tells what patterns you should learn for your coding interview.
That’s all in this list of top 7 books for Coding or Programming interviews. All the papers I have mentioned here are the best of the best, and you can further shortlist depending upon your goals and the companies you are going to interviews.
For example, if you are targeting Google, then Elements of Programming Interviews and Algorithmic design manual is a must-read, but for most of the programming job interviews, Cracking the Coding interview book will do the job as it covers the most popular questions.
Recommended Articles
If you are a book nerd like me, here are a couple of more articles to explore some of the best programming books and their useful resources:
- 10 Books Every Programmer Should Read (list)
- My favorite free courses to learn Algorithms and Data Structure (courses)
- Top 5 Data Structure and Algorithm books (list)
- 10 free courses to learn Java Programming in 2024 (courses)
- 10 Courses to Crack Programming Job Interviews (courses)
- 5 Books that will Make you a Rockstar Developer (list)
- 10 Algorithm Books Every Programmer Should Read (list)
- 5 Object-oriented design, patterns, and best practices books (list)
- 10 Courses to learn Data Structure and Algorithms (courses)
- 6 Books to Learn and Master Programming (list)
- 10 free courses to learn Python Programming in 2024 (courses)
- 50+ Data Structure and Algorithms Problems from Interviews (questions)
Thanks for reading this article so far. If you like these Java Data structures and Algorithms courses, then please share them with your friends and colleagues. If you have any questions or feedback, then please drop a note.
P. S. — If you are looking for some Free Algorithms courses to improve your understanding of Data Structure and Algorithms, then you should also check this list of free Data Structure and Algorithms courses which are entirely free of cost
P.P. S. — Are you ready for the Interview? Take TripleByte’s quiz and go directly to the final round of interviews with top tech companies like Coursera, Adobe, Dropbox, Grammarly, Uber, Quora, Evernote, Twitch, and many more.
