Software Engineer System Design Interview Questions

Practice 1,093 real System Design interview questions for Software Engineer roles. From companies including Meta, OpenAI, Amazon, Anthropic, Google.

1.1k Questions 223 Companies08.16.2026
Showing 20 results
Role
xAI logo
xAI
Medium
Software Engineer Locked

Design backend to score and classify tweets

This question evaluates backend system design skills including data modeling and ingestion, integration with external LLM-style inference APIs, worker...

System Design
15
0
130 people solved
Dec 1, 2025
DoorDash logo
DoorDash
Hard
Software Engineer

Design cron scheduler and reward/review system

System Design: Company-Wide Scheduler Platform and Employee Review & Rewards System You are designing two platforms for a fast-growing, multi-tenant t...

System Design
11
0
192 people solved
Sep 6, 2025
TikTok logo
TikTok
Hard
Software Engineer

Design tables from metrics

Data Modeling Design Task: Short‑Video Social App Analytics You are designing an analytics data model for a short‑video social application. The app su...

System Design
5
0
48 people solved
Sep 6, 2025
Instacart logo
Instacart
Hard
Software Engineer

Design cloud storage with quotas and compression

System Design: Multi‑Tenant Cloud Storage Service (Take‑Home) You are tasked with designing a multi‑tenant cloud storage service that supports file up...

System Design
13
0
96 people solved
Sep 6, 2025
Anthropic logo
Anthropic
Hard
Software Engineer

Guide and override compiler optimizations

Guiding a Compiler for a VLIW-like Backend You are optimizing hot loops for a VLIW-like target (e.g., DSP/AI accelerator) where the compiler sometimes...

System Design
10
0
172 people solved
Sep 6, 2025
Disney logo
Disney
Hard
Software Engineer

Design a global multi-game leaderboard

Design a Global, Multi‑Game Leaderboard (Ladder) Service You are designing a global leaderboard platform used by many different games and modes. Each ...

System Design
11
0
104 people solved
Sep 6, 2025
Meta logo
Meta
Hard
Software Engineer

Design an Instagram-like photo-sharing platform

System Design: Instagram-like Photo and Short-Video Platform Goal Design an Instagram-like platform for photos and short videos. The design should cov...

System Design
4
0
47 people solved
Sep 6, 2025
Apple logo
Apple
Hard
Software Engineer

Migrate a monolithic wallet to microservices

System Design: Migrating a Monolithic Digital Wallet (Apple Cash–like) to Microservices Context You operate a high-scale consumer digital wallet and p...

System Design
6
0
87 people solved
Sep 6, 2025
Google logo
Google
Hard
Software Engineer

Make algorithm code production-ready

Productionizing a Sliding-Window String Algorithm Context: You have implemented a correct sliding-window algorithm for a classic string task (e.g., lo...

System Design
10
0
86 people solved
Sep 6, 2025
Lyft logo
Lyft
Hard
Software Engineer

Design a scalable real-time chat system

System Design: Real-Time Chat (1:1 and Groups) Context Design a mobile-first, globally available real-time chat system that supports both 1:1 and grou...

System Design
15
0
147 people solved
Sep 6, 2025
Meta logo
Meta
Hard
Software Engineer

Design a basic bank system API

In-Memory Bank System: API, Data Model, Invariants, Semantics, and Edge Cases Goal Design and implement an in-memory bank system that supports account...

System Design
9
0
67 people solved
Sep 6, 2025
TikTok logo
TikTok
Hard
Software Engineer

Improve and measure service performance

Assessing and Improving a Service’s Performance Under High Load Context You are responsible for a user-facing, stateless HTTP microservice that handle...

System Design
4
0
62 people solved
Sep 6, 2025
Speak logo
Speak
Medium
Software Engineer

Implement auth and profile APIs

Design an In-Memory HTTP API for Auth and Profile Management Context Design a minimal, single-node, in-memory HTTP API that supports user registration...

System Design
10
0
81 people solved
Sep 6, 2025
Amazon logo
Amazon
Hard
Software Engineer

Design a memory usage switcher with thresholds

System Design: In-Process Memory Usage Switcher Context You are designing an in-process memory guardrail for a backend service. The component monitors...

System Design
7
0
55 people solved
Sep 6, 2025
Airtable logo
Airtable
Medium
Software Engineer

Design a lazy-initialized connection pool

Question Design and implement a thread-safe, lazily initialized connection pool. You are given an immutable base class Connection (you cannot modify i...

System Design
22
0
241 people solved
Sep 6, 2025
Meta logo
Meta
Medium
Software Engineer Locked

Design a fitness tracking app

This question evaluates a candidate's competency in designing end-to-end backend architectures, specifying core APIs, modeling workout and geospatial ...

System Design
7
0
61 people solved
Mar 12, 2026
Meta logo
Meta
Medium
Software Engineer

Design a Scalable Post, Feed, and Search Service

Design a Scalable Post, Feed, and Search Service Design a social-post service with three core capabilities: a user can publish a text post, retrieve a...

System Design
1
0
11 people solved
Mar 2, 2026
OpenAI logo
OpenAI
Hard
Software Engineer Locked

Design a payment system with holds and batching

This question evaluates a candidate's competency in designing reliable, auditable payment workflows, covering authorization holds, batch settlement, i...

System Design
101
0
1049 people solved
Mar 1, 2026
Coinbase logo
Coinbase
Hard
Software Engineer

Design a scalable URL shortener with expiration and security

System Design: URL Shortening Service at Internet Scale You are asked to design a URL shortening service for hundreds of millions of users with high a...

System Design
6
0
94 people solved
Aug 12, 2025
NVIDIA logo
NVIDIA
Medium
Software Engineer

Define a Git workflow for CI

Define a Git workflow for CI Design a Git Branching and Release Strategy for a Graphics Testing Repository Context You are designing the source contro...

System Design
5
0
72 people solved
Aug 9, 2025

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