# How to Prepare for System Design Interviews

Having helped thousands of candidates pass their FAANG interviews, we've learned exactly what works.

## Choose how you want to prepare

We recommend the course if you want a clear order to follow. If you already know what you need, use this page as a plan and choose the lessons and practice problems yourself.

### Follow the System Design Course

Work through video lessons, written guides, quizzes, and full design problems in the order we recommend.

[View the course](/content/learn/courses/system-design/index.html)

### Use the plan below

Build the foundation first, then choose the topics and practice problems that fit what you need.

##### Build a Foundation

1. Understand what a system design interview is: Maybe you've never done a system design interview before, you're not alone! Start by reading our [intro to system design](/content/learn/system-design/in-a-hurry/introduction/index.html) or [watching a video of a mock system design interview.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgSe27eoBG0)

2. Choose a delivery framework: System design interviews move fast. It's important that you have a clear roadmap to help you think linearly and avoid scope creep. We strongly recommend our [Delivery Framework](/content/learn/system-design/in-a-hurry/delivery/index.html). This is the framework you'll follow to design your system come interview day.

3. Start with the basics: If you're new to system design in particular, you'll want to start by learning the basics and mapping out the scope of knowledge required. Start by reading about the [Core Concepts](/content/learn/system-design/in-a-hurry/core-concepts/index.html), [Key Technologies](/content/learn/system-design/in-a-hurry/key-technologies/index.html), and [Common Patterns](/content/learn/system-design/in-a-hurry/patterns/index.html) used in system design interviews. These write-ups are high-level, but they help you build the mental model necessary to build upon.

##### Practice Practice Practice

Once you have the foundation in place, it's time to practice. Passively consuming content is good, but you'll retain 10x more information by actually doing.

1. Choose a question: Select a question from the list of common questions below.

2. Read the requirements: Understand the requirements of the system you'll need to design.

3. Try to answer on your own: Either practice with our [Guided Practices](/content/premium/index.html) (below) or on a virtual whiteboard like [Excalidraw](https://excalidraw.com/).

4. Read the answer key: Only after you have tried to answer the question, read the answer key to see how your answer compares.

5. Put your knowledge to the test: Once you've done a few questions and are feeling comfortable, run a peer mock with someone who works at your target company — telling your design out loud under time pressure is a different skill than reading about it.

|  | Interview Question | Difficulty | Write-Up | Mark as Read | Guided Practice |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|  | Bitly | Easy |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | Dropbox | Easy |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | Yelp | Easy |  |  |  |
|  | Local Delivery Service | Easy |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | Ticketmaster | Medium |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | Instagram | Medium |  |  |  |
|  | FB News Feed | Medium |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | Tinder | Medium |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | LeetCode | Medium |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | WhatsApp | Medium |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | Strava | Medium |  |  |  |
|  | Distributed Cache | Medium |  |  |  |
|  | Rate Limiter | Medium |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | Online Auction | Medium |  |  |  |
|  | YouTube | Medium |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | Job Scheduler | Medium |  |  |  |
|  | FB Live Comments | Medium |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | News Aggregator | Medium |  |  |  |
|  | Price Tracking Service | Medium |  |  |  |
|  | Notification System | Medium |  |  |  |
|  | YouTube Top K | Hard |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | Uber | Hard |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | Robinhood | Hard |  |  |  |
|  | Google Docs | Hard |  |  |  |
|  | Web Crawler | Hard |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | Ad Click Aggregator | Hard |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | FB Post Search | Hard |  |  | StartHistory |
|  | Payment System | Hard |  |  |  |
|  | Metrics Monitoring | Hard |  |  |  |
|  | Online Chess | Hard |  |  |  |
|  | ChatGPT | Hard |  |  |  |
|  | Flash Sale | Hard |  |  |  |

###### More Practice

Full Guided Practice on additional interview questions. These problems don't include a written guide but have the same step-by-step practice and AI feedback and are sourced from real interview questions reported by the community.

|  | Interview Question | Asked At | Difficulty | Guided Practice |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|  | Food Review App |  | Medium |  |
|  | Game Leaderboard |  | Medium |  |
|  | Donations Website |  | Hard |  |
|  | GitHub Actions |  | Hard |  |