Coding Interview University

What it is

Coding Interview University is a multi-month study plan for becoming a software engineer at a large company. Its owner, jwasham, writes that it began as a short to-do list of study topics and grew into the long README you see today. It is a README, not a program. You read it from the top and tick off items as you go. Each topic lists videos, lectures and articles, then things to implement yourself, such as a vector, a linked list or a hash table. The README asks for a little coding experience, patience and time.

1. Pick a language for the plan
2. Watch the videos for the next topic
3. Implement the data structure or algorithm yourself
4. Do two or three interview questions on it
5. Move on to the next topic

Who it suits

People who want about 75% of what a university computer science program teaches, which the README says is enough for an interview. The plan lays it out in an order, with lectures and videos to learn from. The owner missed out on a computer science degree, and the README says this plan will catch you up. For a complete self-taught computer science program, the README points to roadmap.sh/computer-science. It is a plan for software engineering, not for front-end or full-stack work, and the README sends you to roadmap.sh for those paths.

Skip it if you want front-end or full-stack training. The plan leaves out JavaScript, HTML, CSS and SQL.

Where to use it

The plan works anywhere you can open a web page or a Markdown file.

• GitHub: the README, with a table of contents that links to each section
• A ZIP download: unzip it and open the text files in an editor that shows Markdown
• A fork on GitHub: clone it with Git, tick the boxes and commit your progress
• Translations: the README links translated copies, among them Simplified Chinese, Japanese, Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese
• The practice repositories: the owner’s own C, C++ and Python code is in separate repositories that the README links

The README gives no steps for any coding agent. Mindket’s notes for Claude Code, Codex and Cursor are ordinary steps for giving an agent the file to read, and they say so.

How to set it up

Get it saves a zip of Mindket’s setup notes in your downloads folder. The plan itself needs no install, and the README gives no install line.

1. Without Git, use Download ZIP. It is under the Code button near the top of the repository page, and you unzip the file.
2. With Git, fork it and clone your fork. Click Fork on GitHub, then clone your fork with the first block below.
3. Open README.md in a Markdown editor. An editor that shows Markdown formats it, and you start at the top.
4. Tick each item you finish. Put an x in its brackets, like this: [x].

The commands below are copied from the README’s part for people who are comfortable with Git. Replace <YOUR_GITHUB_USERNAME>, angle brackets included, with your own GitHub name. The last line keeps you from pushing your progress to the original repository by mistake.

git clone https://github.com/<YOUR_GITHUB_USERNAME>/coding-interview-university.git
cd coding-interview-university
git remote add upstream https://github.com/jwasham/coding-interview-university.git
git remote set-url --push upstream DISABLE  # so that you don't push your personal progress back to the original repo

After you tick items, these three lines save your progress, pull in the owner’s later changes and push to your fork.

git commit -am "Marked personal progress"
git pull upstream main  # keep your fork up-to-date with changes from the original repo

git push # just pushes to your fork

How to use it

Work through the outline from top to bottom, as the README says. Read a section’s notes before you start, since they say how much to do. The Big-O section, for one, has nothing to implement. Then build what each data structure lists, in the language you chose.

The README’s advice is to start coding questions while you learn, not after. When you finish a topic such as linked lists, open one of the interview books, do two or three questions on it and move on. Come back later for two or three more.

Write your code on paper or a whiteboard first, as the README suggests, then type it and test it. With an agent, name the section and ask it to check your work, not to write it.

Here is my file vector.c. Check it against the "Implement a vector" list under Arrays in README.md. Tell me which functions are missing. Do not rewrite my code.

Example

You reach Arrays in the Data Structures section. The first item is a set of videos on arrays, and a later item asks you to implement a vector, a mutable array that resizes itself. The README lists the functions to write:

size()  capacity()  is_empty()  at(index)  push(item)
insert(index, item)  prepend(item)  pop()  delete(index)
remove(item)  find(item)  resize(new_capacity)

It also gives two resizing rules. Double the size when you reach capacity, and halve it when popping leaves the size at 1/4 of capacity. You write it in your language, check each function by hand, then do two or three array questions from an interview book before you start Linked Lists.

For newcomers and experts

If you are new. A data structure is a way of keeping data so a program can use it quickly, such as an array or a hash table. An algorithm is a method, such as sorting or searching. Big-O is how the plan asks you to describe how a method slows down as its input grows. You only need to express an algorithm’s complexity in Big-O terms, the README says, and need not follow all the math behind it. To start, you need a little experience with variables, loops and functions. Begin with the language choice, then the Big-O videos. The README also has a short section for the worry that you are not smart enough, with two videos.

For experts. The required part runs from Big-O through data structures, binary search, bit operations, trees, sorting and graphs to an Even More Knowledge section. That one covers recursion, dynamic programming, design patterns, combinatorics and probability, NP-completeness, how computers process a program, caches, processes and threads, testing, string searching, tries, floating point numbers, Unicode, endianness and networking. Final Review and the Getting the Job sections close it.

A marked line then starts the optional part, which the README says is not needed for an entry-level interview. It holds extra books, system design, further topics such as compilers, cryptography and garbage collection, a list of video series, courses and papers.

The owner’s own practice code is in separate repositories for C, C++ and Python, and the flashcard site is another. The repository also holds cheat-sheet PDFs under extras.

Good to know

The plan is only text, so nothing here runs on your computer. The questions are about what it links to.

• License: CC-BY-SA-4.0. LICENSE.txt reads “Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International”. Every site, book, video and course the plan links to has its own owner and terms
• Paid links: the README marks a Udemy course and a Udacity Nanodegree as paid, and AlgoMonster as a paid course with free content. It calls LeetCode worth the subscription for the one or two months you prepare. Some links carry tracking parameters such as utm_source=ciu
• Effort: the owner says they studied 8 to 12 hours a day for several months, and that you will not need as much
• Dead links: many links point to videos and course pages. The README warns that some videos need a Coursera or edX class that may not be in session. The maker’s workflow checks the links once a month, so one can be dead when you click
• A missing section: the table of contents lists Find a Job, but on 3 November 2026 the page had no section with that name
• Book links: the two Ruby book links on the language-resources page go to book4you.org, not to a publisher. Check that you may use a book before you download it
• Flashcards: the owner says not to use their own flashcards, since there are too many and most are trivia
• Outbound: the README’s four pictures are hosted at d3j2pkmjtin6ou.cloudfront.net, so a Markdown preview of a ZIP or clone loads them from there. git clone, pull and push talk to GitHub
• Removal: delete the folder. A fork stays in your GitHub account until you delete it in its settings