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System Design Interview Prep Crash Course

Q: How many days does it take to prepare for a System Design interview?

Preparing for a System Design interview can take anywhere from 3 to 10 weeks, depending on your skill level, the role you’re applying to, and other external factors. Ideally, you should commit to 3 hours a day for 5 days a week.

Need to learn System Design in a hurry? Grasp essential concepts, practice real design scenarios, and build interview confidence—all through 15-minute problem sets crafted for speed and impact.

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Overview

Content

Reviews

Need to prep for a system design interview in a hurry? Whether your interview is days away or your schedule is packed, this crash course helps you ramp up fast. Learn the core patterns, apply structured thinking, and solve real-world design problems—all in under 15 minutes per challenge. This is a condensed version of our flagship course, Grokking the Modern System Design Interview for Engineers & Managers, designed to help you build confidence, master fundamentals, and perform under pressure. Perfect for software engineers and managers aiming to ace high-stakes interviews at top tech companies.

Need to prep for a system design interview in a hurry? Whether your interview is days away or your schedule is packed, this cras...Show More

WHAT YOU'LL LEARN

An understanding of system design to get you ready for the interview in less time

Familiarity with a collection of 30 frequently asked design problems and solutions

The ability to pick and choose a problem of your liking and complete it in 15 minutes

An understanding of how various popular web-scale services are constructed

The ability to learn how larger systems use smaller systems as building blocks

An understanding of system design to get you ready for the interview in less time

Content

33 Lessons41 Quizzes

Introduction

2 Lessons

This chapter introduces you to System Design and its Interview, course structure, prerequisites, and how it prepares you for system design interviews.

Introduction to the System Design Interview Prep Crash Course

Course Structure for System Design Interview Prep Crash Course

Elementary Design Problems

17 Lessons

This chapter teaches you fundamental system designs like load balancers, distributed caches, messaging queues, etc. essential for designing real-world systems.

Domain Name System (DNS)

Load Balancers

Databases in Distributed Systems

Design a Key-Value Store

Design a Content Delivery Network (CDN)

Design a Unique ID Generator

Design a Client-Side Monitoring Service

Design a Server-Side Monitoring Service

Design a Distributed Cache

Design a Distributed Messaging Queue

Design a Pub-Sub

Design a Rate Limiter

Design a Blob Store

Design a Distributed Search

Design a Distributed Logging Service

Design a Distributed Task Scheduler

Design Sharded Counters

Advanced Design Problems

13 Lessons

This chapter focuses on complex designs like YouTube, Uber, Google Maps, Instagram, etc., honing your skills for the tough system design interviews.

Design YouTube

Design Quora

Design Google Maps

Design a Proximity Service/Yelp

Design a URL Shortening Service/TinyURL

Design a Web Crawler

Design WhatsApp

Design Typeahead Suggestion

Design a Collaborative Document Editing Service/Google Docs

Concluding Remarks

1 Lessons

This chapter wraps up the course, summarizing key insights and preparing you for success in your upcoming system design interviews.

Conclusion

Certificate of Completion

Showcase your accomplishment by sharing your certificate of completion.

Developed by MAANG Engineers

Every Educative lesson is designed by our in-house team of ex-MAANG software engineers and PhD computer science educators, and developed in consultation with developers and data scientists working at Meta, Google, and more. Our mission is to get you hands-on with the necessary skills to stay ahead in a constantly changing industry. No video, no fluff. Just interactive, project-based learning with personalized feedback that adapts to your goals and experience.

Trusted by 2.7 million developers working at companies

"This is a great course to go through when an interview is close."

Titoh

Learner

"Excellent content, short and to the point."

Gokul Mahajan

Learner

"This is a truly excellent course"

M.Taha Masood

Learner

"The platform's hands-on coding environment and well-structured content enabled me to build confidence and achieve my career goals efficiently."

Sanjay C

Learner

Hands-on Learning Powered by AI

See how Educative uses AI to make your learning more immersive than ever before.

Personalized Interview Prep

Skip the LeetCode grind with a custom roadmap that adapts to your goals. Hands-on practice for Coding Interviews, System Design, and more.

Mock Interviews

Test your skills in a simulated interview setting. Receive personalized feedback based on your performance. Available for Coding Interviews, System Design, and more.

AI Prompt

Build prompt engineering skills. Practice implementing AI-informed solutions.

Code Feedback

Evaluate and debug your code with the click of a button. Get real-time feedback on test cases, including time and space complexity of your solutions.

Explain with AI

Select any text within any Educative course, and get an instant explanation — without ever leaving your browser.

AI Code Mentor

AI Code Mentor helps you quickly identify errors in your code, learn from your mistakes, and nudge you in the right direction — just like a 1:1 tutor!

Course

Grokking the Modern System Design Interview

The ultimate guide to the System Design Interview – developed by FAANG engineers. Master distributed system fundamentals, and practice with real-world interview questions & mock interviews.

26 h

intermediate

Course

System Design Interview: DoorDash

This comprehensive course prepares you for DoorDash software engineer interviews and DoorDash system design interview questions.

1 h

intermediate

Skill Path

Become a Distributed Systems Professional

Distributed systems development is a highly sought-after skill. Expand your job opportunities with lessons designed for upcoming developers like you.

54 h

beginner

Skill Path

Deep Dive into System Design Interview

Build an in-depth understanding of Distributed Systems and Design to ace any System Design interview.

55 h

beginner

Skill Path

Scalability & System Design for Developers

Learn to make better architecture and design decisions for systems that scale.

122 h

intermediate

Course

Advanced System Design Interview Prep

Have a System Design Interview coming up? Brush up on best practices and get interview-ready in <5 hours with a selection of hand-picked, real-world problems.

5 h

advanced

Course

Principles and Practices of Advanced System Design

Ready to become a System Design pro? Unlock the world’s largest distributed systems, including file systems, data processing systems, and databases from hyperscalers like Google, Meta, and Amazon.

20 h

advanced

Course

Machine Learning System Design

Gain insights into ML system design, state-of-the-art techniques, and best practices for scalable production. Learn from top researchers and stand out in your next ML interview.

1 h 30 m

intermediate

Course

Grokking the Modern System Design Interview

intermediate

26 hour

Course

System Design Interview: DoorDash

intermediate

1 hour

Skill Path

Become a Distributed Systems Professional

beginner

54 hour

Skill Path

Deep Dive into System Design Interview

beginner

55 hour

Skill Path

Scalability & System Design for Developers

intermediate

122 hour

Course

Advanced System Design Interview Prep

advanced

5 hour

Course

Principles and Practices of Advanced System Design

advanced

20 hour

Course

Machine Learning System Design

intermediate

1 hour 30 min

Free Resources

blog

Components of System Design

blog

System Design Interview Questions

cheatsheet

What is Availability in System Design?

blog

System Design fundamentals

blog

Amazon System design Interview Questions

cheatsheet

System Design Building Blocks

cheatsheet

What is Performance in System Design?

blog

Distributed Systems

blog

Scalable Systems

blog

FAANG/MAANG System Design Interview

blog

Facebook System Design Interview Questions

cheatsheet

Solve Any System Design Interview Question

blog

Microsoft System Design Interview

blog

Uber Backend System Design

blog

Google System Design Interview Questions

Frequently Asked Questions

How many days does it take to prepare for a System Design interview?

Preparing for a System Design interview can take anywhere from 3 to 10 weeks, depending on your skill level, the role you’re applying to, and other external factors. Ideally, you should commit to 3 hours a day for 5 days a week.