LeetCode 1921, Medium. Topics: Array, Greedy, Sorting. View on LeetCode.
Generate this problem as a practice environment: tested reference solution, 34 parametrized pytest cases, and a playground notebook:
Problem
You are playing a video game where you are defending your city from a group of n monsters. You are given a 0-indexed integer array dist of size n, where dist[i] is the initial distance in kilometers of the ith monster from the city.
The monsters walk toward the city at a constant speed. The speed of each monster is given to you in an integer array speed of size n, where speed[i] is the speed of the ith monster in kilometers per minute.
You have a weapon that, once fully charged, can eliminate a single monster. However, the weapon takes one minute to charge. The weapon is fully charged at the very start.
You lose when any monster reaches your city. If a monster reaches the city at the exact moment the weapon is fully charged, it counts as a loss, and the game ends before you can use your weapon.
Return the maximum number of monsters that you can eliminate before you lose, or n if you can eliminate all the monsters before they reach the city.
Examples
Constraints
- n == dist.length == speed.length
- 1 <= n <= 10^5
- 1 <= dist[i], speed[i] <= 10^5
Solution
Reference implementation from solution.py on GitHub, full suite in test_solution.py:
Complexity
NeetCode All. Last modified on September 7, 2026