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#184
Medium Database

Department highest salary

Database
57.3% acceptance
Feb 27, 2026
2368
209
Table: Employee +--------------+---------+ | Column Name | Type | +--------------+---------+ | id | int | | name | varchar | | salary | int | | departmentId | int | +--------------+---------+ id is the primary key (column with unique values) for this table. departmentId is a foreign key (reference columns) of the ID from the Department table. Each row of this table indicates the ID, name, and salary of an employee. It also contains the ID of their department. Table: Department +-------------+---------+ | Column Name | Type | +-------------+---------+ | id | int | | name | varchar | +-------------+---------+ id is the primary key (column with unique values) for this table. It is guaranteed that department name is not NULL. Each row of this table indicates the ID of a department and its name. Write a solution to find employees who have the highest salary in each of the departments. Return the result table in any order. The result format is in the following example.

Solution

SQL
LeetCode
solution.sql
--
-- Table: Employee
-- +--------------+---------+
-- | Column Name  | Type    |
-- +--------------+---------+
-- | id           | int     |
-- | name         | varchar |
-- | salary       | int     |
-- | departmentId | int     |
-- +--------------+---------+
-- id is the primary key (column with unique values) for this table.
-- departmentId is a foreign key (reference columns) of the ID from the Department table.
-- Each row of this table indicates the ID, name, and salary of an employee. It also contains the ID of their department.
-- Table: Department
-- +-------------+---------+
-- | Column Name | Type    |
-- +-------------+---------+
-- | id          | int     |
-- | name        | varchar |
-- +-------------+---------+
-- id is the primary key (column with unique values) for this table. It is guaranteed that department name is not NULL.
-- Each row of this table indicates the ID of a department and its name.
-- Write a solution to find employees who have the highest salary in each of the departments.
-- Return the result table in any order.
-- The result format is in the following example.
-- Example 1:
-- Input:
-- Employee table:
-- +----+-------+--------+--------------+
-- | id | name  | salary | departmentId |
-- +----+-------+--------+--------------+
-- | 1  | Joe   | 70000  | 1            |
-- | 2  | Jim   | 90000  | 1            |
-- | 3  | Henry | 80000  | 2            |
-- | 4  | Sam   | 60000  | 2            |
-- | 5  | Max   | 90000  | 1            |
-- +----+-------+--------+--------------+
-- Department table:
-- +----+-------+
-- | id | name  |
-- +----+-------+
-- | 1  | IT    |
-- | 2  | Sales |
-- +----+-------+
-- Output:
-- +------------+----------+--------+
-- | Department | Employee | Salary |
-- +------------+----------+--------+
-- | IT         | Jim      | 90000  |
-- | Sales      | Henry    | 80000  |
-- | IT         | Max      | 90000  |
-- +------------+----------+--------+
-- Explanation: Max and Jim both have the highest salary in the IT department and Henry has the highest salary in the Sales department.
--

# Write your MySQL query statement below

SELECT d.name AS Department, e.name AS Employee, e.salary AS Salary
FROM Employee e
JOIN Department d ON e.departmentId = d.id
WHERE (e.departmentId, e.salary) IN (
  SELECT departmentId, MAX(salary)
  FROM Employee
  GROUP BY departmentId
)