// system design mastery course

Complete System Design
Roadmap & Course

Duration: 24 Weeks
Track: LLD + HLD + ML Systems + K8s
Style: Balanced · Interview + Concepts
Audience: Beginners → FAANG-Ready
① Week-by-Week Gantt
② Topic Dependency Graph
③ Milestone Progression
Phase 0 · Foundation
Track A · LLD
Track B · HLD
Phase 2 · Convergence
Phase 3 · Advanced
Phase 4 · Mock + Capstone
Track C · Advanced Topics
Task/Project
⬡ PHASE 0 — Foundation (Weeks 1–2) · Prerequisites for everything below
Networking BasicsTCP/IP · HTTP · DNS
OS FundamentalsThreads · I/O · Memory
Database BasicsACID · Index · Tx
SD Interview FrameworkReq → Est → HLD → Tradeoffs
Back-of-Envelope EstimationQPS · Storage · Bandwidth
⬇ unlocks both tracks
⬇ both tracks converge
⬡ PHASE 2 — Convergence: Full System Designs (Weeks 17–20)
⬡ PHASE 3 — Advanced Production Topics (Weeks 21–22)
MaintainabilityObservability · SLOs Security PatternsAuthN · AuthZ · mTLS
Cost OptimizationSpot · Reserved · Tiering
Fraud Detection SystemMini Project
Auth + Monitoring SystemMini Project
⬡ PHASE 4 — Mock Interviews + Capstone (Weeks 23–24)
20 Mock ProblemsWith rubric
Capstone: Uber E2ELLD + HLD
Capstone: YouTube E2ELLD + HLD + CDN
Capstone: BookMyShowConcurrency + Scale
↓ optional advanced track
24
Total Weeks
14
HLD Modules
6
LLD Modules
23
Design Patterns
20+
System Designs
3
Capstone Projects
Build the non-negotiable baseline. Networking, OS, DB basics, and the SD Interview Framework. Learn Back-of-Envelope estimation as a repeatable skill. Everyone starts here.
Task: Estimate Instagram / WhatsApp / YouTube
Task: Write requirements doc for 3 systems
5 Topics
2 Weeks
Master SOLID principles with real violations and fixes. Learn UML Class and Sequence diagrams. Build the design instinct before patterns.
Task: Refactor badly designed Parking Lot
Unlock: All Design Patterns
⚡ Open Interactive Notes
Singleton, Factory, Abstract Factory, Builder, Prototype — each mapped to a real system (Logging, Parking Lot, Snake & Ladder, Chess, File System).
Mini Project: ATM System
5 Pattern Implementations
Adapter, Decorator, Proxy, Composite, Facade, Bridge, Flyweight — mapped to Vending Machine, Pizza Billing, Car Rental, Splitwise, CricBuzz, TrueCaller.
Mini Project: Splitwise + Simplify Algorithm
7 Pattern Implementations
12 behavioral patterns: Strategy, Observer, Chain of Responsibility, State, Command, Iterator, Mediator, Memento, Template Method, Visitor, Null Object, Interpreter.
Mini Project: BookMyShow + Concurrency
12 Pattern Implementations
Threads, Locks, Semaphores, Monitors. Producer-Consumer, Thread Pool, Deadlock prevention. The bridge between OOP design and systems programming.
Task: Thread-safe BookMyShow booking engine
Unlock: Advanced LLD Systems
LinkedIn, Amazon, Uber/Ola, Hotel Booking, Online Voting, Cache Mechanism, Rate Limiter, Food Delivery, Chat System, Restaurant Management, Bowling Alley.
Major Project: Uber LLD end-to-end
10+ System Designs
✅ LLD Track Complete
Scalability, CAP Theorem, Consistency Models, Availability Patterns, Load Balancing, Latency vs Throughput. Back-of-envelope estimation and the SD Interview Framework.
Task: Back-of-envelope estimation for 3 systems
Task: CAP trade-off analysis for 5 real systems
⚡ Open Interactive Module 📝 Study Notes
Indexing (B-Tree, Hash, Composite), ACID vs BASE, SQL vs NoSQL decision framework, Replication (leader-follower, multi-leader), Sharding (range, hash, consistent), DB Selection Guide.
Task: DB design for Instagram
Task: Sharding strategy for Twitter
⚡ Open Interactive Module 📝 Study Notes
Cache-Aside, Write-Through, Write-Back, Read-Through patterns. LRU/LFU eviction, cache invalidation strategies, stampede prevention. Redis data structures and CDN caching.
Task: Caching layer for Twitter feed
Task: Redis sorted set leaderboard design
⚡ Open Interactive Module 📝 Study Notes
Async messaging patterns, Kafka architecture (partitions, offsets, consumer groups), at-least-once vs exactly-once delivery guarantees, push vs pull semantics, event-driven backpressure.
Task: Notification pipeline with Kafka
Base62 encoding strategies, distributed unique ID generation (Snowflake), API rate limiting, 301 vs 302 redirects, caching topologies, read-heavy system scaling.
Project: Build a scalable URL Shortener
Fan-out on write vs read methodologies, hybrid timeline generation for celebrities, distributed caching with Redis, timeline pre-computation, asynchronous count updates.
Task: Fan-out strategy for 100M followers
Persistent WebSockets with session stores, Cassandra optimizations for chat history, three-state delivery receipts, high-throughput presence systems, group messaging fan-out.
Task: 45-min full WhatsApp interview simulation
Chunked resumable uploads with SHA-256 deduplication, temporal parallelism transcoding (60× speedup), HLS adaptive bitrate streaming (.m3u8 manifests + .ts segments), 3-tier CDN architecture (58 Tbps), sharded view counter with Kafka durability, Elasticsearch search via CDC.
Task: Transcoding pipeline for 8.3 hrs video/sec
Task: CDN pre-warming strategy for viral videos
Task: 45-min full YouTube design simulation
⚡ Open Interactive Module 📝 Study Notes
Five rate limiting algorithms with exact memory/accuracy trade-offs: Fixed Window, Sliding Window Log, Sliding Window Counter (production default), Token Bucket, Leaky Bucket. Redis Lua scripts for atomicity, centralised vs distributed strategies, HTTP 429 headers, multi-tier architecture at CDN → Gateway → App → DB layers.
Task: Algorithm selection for 5 real scenarios
Task: Redis Lua implementation + failure modes
Task: Add rate limiting to URL Shortener (B5)
⚡ Open Interactive Module 📝 Study Notes
Why modulo hashing breaks when nodes change, hash ring with [0, 2³²) address space, clockwise key lookup (TreeMap ceilingEntry), virtual nodes (150/node) for uniform distribution, heterogeneous capacity weighting. Service discovery patterns: client-side, server-side, DNS (Kubernetes CoreDNS). Consul HTTP API, ZooKeeper ephemeral znodes, health checks, gossip protocol vs Raft.
Task: Implement ConsistentHashRing in Java (TreeMap)
Task: Virtual node distribution analysis (1–300 vnodes)
Task: Service discovery design for 50 microservices
Task: Add consistent hashing to URL Shortener cache
⚡ Open Interactive Module 📝 Study Notes
ACID properties, isolation levels. The distributed transaction problem: no ACID across DBs. Two-Phase Commit (blocking, coordinator SPOF). Saga pattern: local transactions + compensating transactions. Choreography vs Orchestration. Outbox pattern for atomic DB + event publishing. Idempotency keys. BASE vs ACID.
Task: Design a payment saga with compensation path
Task: 2PC vs Saga — money transfer trade-offs
Task: Capstone — full Place Order saga (Order, Payment, Inventory, Shipping, Notification)
⚡ Open Interactive Module 📝 Study Notes
The 7-step framework for 45-minute system design interviews. Time allocation map. Requirements templates. Capacity estimation cheat sheet. Communication patterns that signal seniority. 7 most common mistakes. 6 full mock interview problems (Pastebin, Notifications, Job Scheduler, Google Drive, Live Streaming, Autocomplete). Quick answers card.
Task: 6 mock interviews — 45 min timed, no notes
Task: Identify personal weaknesses from mock review
⚡ Open Interactive Module 📝 Study Notes
Feature stores, training pipelines, model serving, A/B testing infrastructure, recommendation systems, real-time ML inference at scale. MLOps fundamentals.
Mini Project: Design a Recommendation System
Task: Design Feature Store
⚡ Open Interactive Module
Containers → Pods → Services → Ingress. Deployments, StatefulSets, HPA, resource management. Service mesh basics (Istio). K8s in system design interviews.
Task: K8s architecture for a microservices system
⚡ Open Interactive Module
✅ HLD Track Complete
🔀 Phase 2 — Convergence: Full System Designs
Weeks 17–20
Both tracks merge. Apply LLD + HLD together. Each system: Requirements → Estimation → HLD diagram → Deep dive 2 components → Trade-offs. 10+ complete system designs.
⚡ Phase 3 — Advanced Production Topics
Weeks 21–22
Maintainability, Observability, SLOs. Security patterns (AuthN, AuthZ, mTLS, Zero Trust). Cost optimization (Spot instances, tiered storage). Fraud detection + Auth+Monitoring system designs.
Mini Project: Fraud Detection System
Mini Project: Auth + Monitoring System
⚡ C4 — Observability & SRE ⚡ C5 — Security Architecture
🏆 Phase 4 — Mock Interviews + Capstone
Weeks 23–24
20 timed mock problems with evaluation rubric. Then the final capstone: choose one end-to-end project that combines everything — LLD entities, HLD architecture, storage, reliability, and trade-off analysis.
⚡ 20 Mock Interview Problems
Capstone: Uber E2E (LLD + HLD)
⚡ Capstone: YouTube E2E (+ CDN + Storage)
Capstone: BookMyShow (Concurrency + Scale)
✅ Course Complete · FAANG Ready
🔬 Track C — Advanced Topics (Optional)
Weeks 25–29
Deep-dive into production-grade advanced systems. Five focused modules covering distributed consensus (Raft/Paxos), geo-distribution, ML infrastructure, observability/SRE, and security architecture.