FastPrepWord Ladder

Word Ladder

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Problem statement

Given two distinct lowercase words beginWord and endWord, and an array wordList, return the number of words in the shortest transformation sequence from beginWord to endWord.

The problem statement continues
Pro

Examples

Example 1

beginWord = "hit"endWord = "cog"wordList = ["hot","dot","dog","lot","log","cog"]return = 5

One shortest sequence is hit → hot → dot → dog → cog, which contains 5 words.

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FastPrep Pro
Reported in 1 Google interview this week

Unlock this recently reported problem

FastPrep Pro gives you full access to interview problems reported within the last week.

  • Full problem statement and constraints
  • 2 more worked examples, explained
  • Guided hints and editorial
  • Run your code on real test cases
$8.25/month

$99 billed yearly — or $19 month-to-month. Cancel anytime.

Free plan — 2 of 2 free unlocks used this week