Editorial: Third Distinct Maximum

by admin · Oct. 18, 2026

1 Intuition

Keep only the three largest distinct values seen so far.

2 Approach

Maintain a tiny sorted list of at most three distinct values; skip duplicates.

3 Complexity Analysis

Time O(n), Space O(1).

4 Solution Code

class Solution:
    def thirdMax(self, nums: list[int]) -> int:
        top = []
        for x in nums:
            if x in top:
                continue
            top.append(x)
            top.sort(reverse=True)
            if len(top) > 3:
                top.pop()
        return top[2] if len(top) == 3 else top[0]

5 Code Walkthrough

The reference solution below implements the approach step by step.