YOUR BRIEF
What to work through
Work through leetCode as a spoken system design interview. Start by clarifying the scope, sketch a working design and explain the trade-offs behind your choices.
- View a list of coding problems
- View a problem and write a solution in one of several languages
- Submit a solution and get the result
- View a live leaderboard during a competition
BEFORE YOU START
Constraints to discuss
- Results come back within 5 seconds
- User code runs isolated and cannot harm the system
- Competitions of 100,000 users
- Availability over consistency
Need a starting point?
Watch for these common gaps as you prepare:
- Running user code inside the API server
- A sandbox that can reach the network or the database
- Scaling the runners up on one big machine
- A sorted SQL query for the leaderboard on every poll
- Taking the user id or timestamps from the client
- Spending so long on requirements that the API and schema never get drawn
Why this question is in the collection
These sources connect the problem to company interview reports or preparation guides. They do not guarantee what a company will ask you.