Best Time to Buy and Sell Stock III
You are given an integer array prices where prices[i] is the price of a given stock on the ith day.
You may complete at most two transactions.
A transaction consists of:
- Buying one stock.
- Selling that stock later.
You must sell the stock before buying again.
Return the maximum profit you can achieve.
Example 1
Input
n = 8 prices = [3, 3, 5, 0, 0, 3, 1, 4]
Output
6
Explanation
The maximum profit can be achieved with two transactions:
Buy at 3 → Sell at 5 = 2
Buy at 0 → Sell at 4 = 4
Total profit:
2 + 4 = 6
Example 2
Input
n = 5 prices = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
Output
n = 5 prices = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
Explanation
The best strategy is one transaction:
Buy at 1 → Sell at 5
Profit:
5 - 1 = 4
Using a second transaction cannot increase the profit.
Constraints
Hints:
Hint 1
Think about the four important states:
- First buy
- First sell
- Second buy
- Second sell
Hint 2
Maintain the best value for each state while traversing the prices.
Author & Technical Reviewer
Technically reviewed by: ExamAdda Technical Review Team
Technical Reviewers, ExamAdda
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Published
Aug 24, 2026
Last updated
Aug 24, 2026
Content Verification Methodology
Definitions and complexity claims were checked against authoritative computer-science references. Code examples were compiled and tested with standard, boundary and edge-case inputs.
Expected Output