C Exercises: Find the median of two sorted arrays of same size

Last update on March 18 2025 13:23:29 (UTC/GMT +8 hours)

64. Median of Two Sorted Arrays (Same Size)

Write a program in C to find the median of two sorted arrays of the same size.

Expected Output :
The given array - 1 is : 1 5 13 24 35
The given array - 2 is : 3 8 15 17 32
The Median of the 2 sorted arrays is: 14

The task is to write a C program that finds the median of two sorted arrays of the same size. The program should merge the two arrays while maintaining the sorted order and then determine the median value of the combined array. The median is the middle element when the total number of elements is odd, or the average of the two middle elements when it is even.

Sample Solution:

C Code:

#include <stdio.h>

// Function to return the maximum of two numbers
int max(int a, int b) {
return ((a > b) ? a : b);
}

// Function to return the minimum of two numbers
int min(int a, int b) {
return ((a < b) ? a : b);
}

// Function to find the median of an array
int median(int arr[], int size) {
if (size % 2 == 0)
return (arr[size/2] + arr[size/2-1])/2;
else
return arr[size/2];
}

// Function to find the median of two sorted arrays
int median2SortedArrays(int arr1[], int arr2[], int size) {
int med1;
int med2;

if(size <= 0) return -1; // If the size is invalid, return -1
if(size == 1) return (arr1[0] + arr2[0])/2; // If there's only one element in each array, return their average
if (size == 2) return (max(arr1[0], arr2[0]) + min(arr1[1], arr2[1])) / 2; // If there are two elements in each array, return their median

   med1 = median(arr1, size); // Find the median of the first array
   med2 = median(arr2, size); // Find the median of the second array

if(med1 == med2) return med1; // If both medians are equal, return any of them

if (med1 < med2) {
return median2SortedArrays(arr1 + size/2, arr2, size - size/2); // Recursively call the function with adjusted arrays
   }
else {
return median2SortedArrays(arr2 + size/2, arr1, size - size/2); // Recursively call the function with adjusted arrays
   }
}

int main() {
int i, m, n;
int arr1[] = {1, 5, 13, 24, 35};
int arr2[] = {3, 8, 15, 17, 32};
   m = sizeof(arr1) / sizeof(arr1[0]);
   n = sizeof(arr2) / sizeof(arr2[0]);

   // Print original arrays
printf("The given array - 1 is :  ");
for(i = 0; i < m; i++) {
printf("%d  ", arr1[i]);
   }
printf("\n");

printf("The given array - 2 is :  ");
for(i = 0; i < n; i++) {
printf("%d  ", arr2[i]);
   }
printf("\n");

   // Calculate and print the median of the two sorted arrays
printf("\nThe Median of the 2 sorted arrays is: %d",median2SortedArrays(arr1, arr2, n));
printf("\n");
return 0;
}

Output:

The given array - 1 is :  1  5  13  24  35  
The given array - 2 is :  3  8  15  17  32  

The Median of the 2 sorted arrays is: 14

Flowchart:/p>

For more Practice: Solve these Related Problems:

Write a C program to find the median of two sorted arrays of equal size using a binary search approach.
Write a C program to merge two sorted arrays of the same size and then compute the median without fully sorting the merged array.
Write a C program to find the median of two sorted arrays using recursion and divide-and-conquer techniques.
Write a C program to determine the median by comparing the medians of the two arrays and then narrowing the search range.

C Programming Code Editor:

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