2 yearss ago

Google is a top company that provides various consumer and business-oriented services. Due to its outstanding culture, it's one of the best employers for software developers and engineers. Google uses a systems design round to assess engineering design skills as part of its technical interview process, along with the behavioral and coding rounds which are also carried out during the on-site interview.

The systems design interview is a whiteboard interview in wherein you will be asks questions about system designs and how they would approach certain problems. You may be asked to design a system for storing data, retrieving information, or handling traffic.

In order to prepare for this type of interview, you should go over some common system design interview questions. This post will list some of the most common interview questions for software developers and provide tips to ace the interview.

What Is a Systems Design Interview? 

A systems interview is a technical interview designed to assess skills in software development. It focuses on handling system design and programming challenges, especially for computer science-related roles such as software developers and engineers.

The interview aims at measuring your ability to design real-world systems by evaluating how you analyze problems, come up with solutions and tradeoffs, and evaluate the pros and cons of various designs. It provides recruiters with the opportunity to gauge your skills in coding and systems design.

During the interview, you will be presented with open-ended questions that require a high level of system design knowledge. You may be asked to develop a solution for storing data or optimizing traffic flow, among others. Your ability to clearly explain your thought process and the rationale behind your design decisions will be key to success.

What to Expect in Google Systems Design Interview Process 

After the technical phone interview, the systems design interview round begins. You won't be asked any system design questions during the first phone screen since it will focus more on coding, algorithms, and data structures. The second interview is usually a whiteboard interview in which you'll be asked to solve system design questions.

The design interview is held much later, after the in-person or on-site interview. After passing the phone screen, you will be invited to Google's campus for on-site technical and behavioral interviews. The interview is usually held in a conference room, and you'll be facing interviewers from different teams.

During the interview, you will be asked questions on coding, behavioral questions, and system design. You need to prepare for all three types of interviews since you may not know which type of question will be asked.

Topics to Expect in a Systems Design Interview

The interview questions for system design aim to see how you break down a large issue and tackle various parts of it. You will be given a problem to solve, and recruiters expect you to take the initiative in the interview and ask clarifying questions.

The interview is not different from a regular conversation; therefore, keep your answers short and simple. While your technical skills are essential, your critical thinking will be evaluated in these stages. It's difficult to narrow down the topics for such an interview.

However, according to the expertise of top-rated recruiters, the following are some of the essential categories to consider while preparing for a systems design interview questions for software engineering and developers:

• Basics of API design

• Systems design case studies

• MapReduce and distributed file systems

• Storage and retrieval

• Cache

• Measuring the performance of scalable systems

• Sharding techniques

• Replication 

• Scaling distributed applications

• Basics of networking

• Basics of systems design

  
  

Google Systems Design Interview Questions

It's critical to know the answers to many system design questions to do well on Google's system design round. Here are sample interview questions for software developers and engineers, along with the approach you should take to answer them:

Question 1: Design a Chat Application

What's the best design approach for implementing a messaging system like WhatsApp? It is another design issue, and your ideal answer should be:

• Offer customization of privacy settings

• Provide end-to-end encryption

• Support media like images and documents, even videos and sound recordings if possible.

• Support push notifications

• Consider offering last seen

• Offer delivered and read receipts

• Support group-chats

• Support one-on-one chatting between users

Question 2: Design a Video Streaming Service

A common design interview question is to create a worldwide video streaming service like Netflix or YouTube.When it comes to creating a video streaming service, your ideal answer should be:

• Discuss client design components, backend, and OC

• Allow many users to view and share videos at the same time by scaling well

• Be able to transmit and store petabytes of information

• Count and show the number of downvotes, upvotes, and views on individual videos

• Allow users to make comments on videos in real-time

• Allow the user to upload, search, and view videos

Question 3: Design an Autocomplete Feature for Search Queries

Another common interview question is designing a search autocomplete feature. This interview question is essential. Your system design interview answer should be:

• Support real-time search by building a quick index

• Manage multiple indexes and keep them updated in real-time

• Handle user queries without losing efficiency or performance when the number of queries increases with time

Here are some sorts of Google system design software engineering intervie questions as well as software developers that you may expect:

Interview Questions for Software Developers

• How do you design efficient APIs?

• What are some caching strategies for web applications?

• How can you measure the performance of a scalable system?

• What is the best way to handle replication in a distributed system?

• How do you partition data when scaling a database?

• What sharding techniques are available?

• How do you scale distributed applications?

• What does a firewall do in network security and its limitations?

• Describe the basics of networking.

• How can you increase the capacity of an existing system to accommodate more users? 

Software Engineering Interview Questions: 

• What are some common system design interview questions for software engineering?

• How can you optimize and measure the performance of a system?

• What are some common caching strategies for web applications?

• What tips do you have for designing efficient APIs?

• What firewall rules should be in place to protect a network from attacks?

• How can you increase the capacity of an existing system to accommodate more users?

• How can you design an e-commerce website that supports high traffic?

• How would you design a web crawler? 

These are some of the questions you may be asked in a system design interview. Be sure to brush up on your system design interview skills before going for an interview at Google!

Tips to Prepare for the Google Systems Design Interview

Google systems design interview questions can be challenging and tricky. You can improve your chances of dealing with interview questions for software developers and engineers by practicing these questions with our dedicated recruiter. You can better handle system design questions that may throw at you and pass the round with practice.

Below are tips to prepare for Google system interview questions for software developers:

Give yourself enough time to prepare: Most interview candidates take a minimum of three months to prepare. The interview process can be time-consuming and requires plenty of practice to succeed. Be sure you give yourself enough time to score well in the interview round.

Spend some time reading interview experiences: Go to interview websites and read the interview experiences that candidates have shared. It will provide you with an idea of the interview process, how much preparation you need to do, and how much time to spend on each question.

Understand the system design interview process: System design interviews are not like regular programming interviews. You will be asked to think about designing a system and then explain your approach. There is no one correct answer for these types of questions, so you must spend time understanding the problem before attempting to provide a solution.

Read relevant books: A few good books will help you prepare for system design interview questions. Reading books will help you understand more about dealing with interview questions for software developers and engineers that involve system design.

Practice interview questions: You can practice interview questions with our expert recruiters at Recruitmently. We will help you prepare for interview questions and give you feedback on how to improve your chances of passing the interview round. This will help enhance your interview skills and make it easier to score well in an interview round.

Systems Design Interview Tips to Keep in Mind

You could falter on the day of the interview, no matter how well-prepared you are. Here are tips on how to make a good first impression during your google systems design interview:

1. Before you can solve a problem, you should first understand it: It's essential to understand the issues thoroughly before solving them. Before you start working on a solution, ask the hiring manager your doubts. To acquire an understanding of what is required, ask the appropriate questions. Ask questions about latency, scalability, and scale.

2. Consider how you'll put your ideas into action: Once you have a solid understanding of the problem, start outlining your solution. Keep in mind that recruiters are interested in how you'll execute your ideas, not just what they are.

3. Your solutions should be realistic and feasible: Don't propose outrageous or impossible solutions – hiring managers will see right through them. Make sure your solutions are achievable and can be implemented without too much trouble.

4. Be prepared to defend your ideas: You'll likely be asked to explain and defend your solutions during the interview. Be ready to answer tough questions and justify your choices.

5. Stay calm and collected: Even if you're feeling overwhelmed, try not to show it. Remain calm and professional throughout the interview. Collect your thoughts before responding to the interviewer's questions.

Remember, hiring managers and recruiters are looking for candidates who can think on their feet and develop creative solutions under pressure. If you can showcase your problem-solving skills and demonstrate that you have what it takes to design systems that work, you'll have a good chance of landing the job.

Ready to Ace Your Next Interview?

Regardless of whether you want to land a job as a software developer or software Engineer, our expert recruiters can help you prepare for interview questions and improve your chances of getting the job.

Recruitmently connects you with a recruiter who can provide courses, career coaching, and interview preparation advice tailored to your needs so that you may enhance your technical interview skills! So book a recruiter today!