TheDataScientist
SQL problemINTERMEDIATEDifficulty: INTERMEDIATEWindow functions~8 min

Second highest salary per department

Return the second highest salary in each department. If a department has fewer than two distinct salaries, it should not appear.

Handle ties correctly: if two people share the highest salary, the second highest is the next distinct value below it.

Given

employees

column type
employee_id int
department_id int
name text
salary numeric

Starting point

sql
SELECT
    -- your query here
FROM employees

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SQL Interview

What is the difference between RANK, DENSE_RANK and ROW_NUMBER?

They differ only in how they handle ties: ROW_NUMBER never ties, RANK ties and skips, DENSE_RANK ties and does not skip.

BeginnerDifficulty: Beginner