Mislabeled Jar Puzzle

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This is the most commonly asked interview puzzle.

You have 3 jars that are all mislabeled. One jar contains Apple, another contains Oranges and the third jar contains a mixture of both Apple and Oranges.

You are allowed to pick as many fruits as you want from each jar to fix the labels on the jars. What is the minimum number of fruits that you have to pick and from which jars to correctly label them?

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  • 1 Answer(s)

    Let’s take a scenario. Suppose you pick from jar labelled as Apple and Oranges and you got Apple from it. That means that jar should be Apple as it is incorrectly labelled. So it has to be Apple jar.
    Now the jar labelled Oranges has to be Mixed as it cannot be the Oranges jar as they are wrongly labelled and the jar labelled Apple has to be Oranges.

    Similar scenario applies if it’s a Oranges taken out from the jar labeled as Apple and Oranges. So you need to pick just one fruit from the jar labeled as Apple and Oranges to correctly label the jars.

    ronret45 Expert Answered on 29th July 2015.
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