Skip to main content

How Many Numbers Are Smaller Than the Current Number

Problem Description​

Given the array nums, for each nums[i] find out how many numbers in the array are smaller than it. That is, for each nums[i] you have to count the number of valid j's such that j != i and nums[j] < nums[i].

Return the answer in an array.

Example​

Example 1:

Input: nums = [8,1,2,2,3]
Output: [4,0,1,1,3]
Explanation:
For nums[0]=8 there exist four smaller numbers than it (1, 2, 2 and 3).
For nums[1]=1 does not exist any smaller number than it.
For nums[2]=2 there exist one smaller number than it (1).
For nums[3]=2 there exist one smaller number than it (1).
For nums[4]=3 there exist three smaller numbers than it (1, 2 and 2).

Example 2:

Input: nums = [6,5,4,8]
Output: [2,1,0,3]

Constraints​

  • 2 <= nums.length <= 500

Solution Approach​

Intuition:​

To efficiently determine the Numbers Are Smaller Than the Current Number

Solution Implementation​

Code In Different Languages:​

Written by @Ishitamukherjee2004
 
class Solution {
smallerNumbersThanCurrent(nums) {
let n = nums.length;
let ans = new Array(n);
for (let i = 0; i < n; i++) {
let cnt = 0;
for (let j = 0; j < n; j++) {
if (nums[i] > nums[j]) {
cnt++;
}
}
ans[i] = cnt;
}
return ans;
}
}


Complexity Analysis​

  • Time Complexity: O(n2)O(n^2)
  • Space Complexity: O(n)O(n)
  • The time complexity is O(log(n))O(log(n)) where n is the length of the input array nums. This is because the algorithm uses a nested loop structure, where each element in the array is compared to every other element.
  • The space complexity is O(n)O(n) where n is the length of the input array nums. This is because the algorithm creates a new array ans of the same length as the input array to store the results.