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Approximate a percentile from buckets

Last updated: Mar 29, 2026

Quick Overview

This question evaluates a candidate's ability to estimate percentiles from aggregated histogram data, testing competency in statistical estimation, handling binned distributions, interpolation reasoning, and assumptions about within-bucket variability.

  • medium
  • Google
  • Statistics & Math
  • Data Scientist

Approximate a percentile from buckets

Company: Google

Role: Data Scientist

Category: Statistics & Math

Difficulty: medium

Interview Round: Technical Screen

You are given a histogram-style summary of query popularity. Each bucket is represented as `(left_bd, right_bd, count)`, meaning that `count` queries have `search_count` values falling in the interval `[left_bd, right_bd)` for a fixed analysis window. There are `K` such buckets, sorted by boundary, non-overlapping, and together they cover the full data range. You do **not** have the individual query-level `search_count` values. Given only these bucket summaries, estimate the `n`th percentile of `search_count`. In your answer: - Explain how to identify which bucket contains the percentile. - Discuss why simply returning the midpoint `(left_bd + right_bd) / 2` of that bucket can be a poor approximation. - Provide a better approximation method using interpolation within the bucket. - State any assumptions and edge cases, especially when bucket widths are unequal or the distribution within a bucket may be skewed.

Quick Answer: This question evaluates a candidate's ability to estimate percentiles from aggregated histogram data, testing competency in statistical estimation, handling binned distributions, interpolation reasoning, and assumptions about within-bucket variability.

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Google
Mar 9, 2025, 12:00 AM
Data Scientist
Technical Screen
Statistics & Math
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You are given a histogram-style summary of query popularity. Each bucket is represented as (left_bd, right_bd, count), meaning that count queries have search_count values falling in the interval [left_bd, right_bd) for a fixed analysis window. There are K such buckets, sorted by boundary, non-overlapping, and together they cover the full data range. You do not have the individual query-level search_count values.

Given only these bucket summaries, estimate the nth percentile of search_count.

In your answer:

  • Explain how to identify which bucket contains the percentile.
  • Discuss why simply returning the midpoint (left_bd + right_bd) / 2 of that bucket can be a poor approximation.
  • Provide a better approximation method using interpolation within the bucket.
  • State any assumptions and edge cases, especially when bucket widths are unequal or the distribution within a bucket may be skewed.

Solution

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