SystemsExpert vs Grokking the System Design Interview SHOWDOWN

SystemsExpert vs Grokking the System Design Interview… Which prep course is better?

FAANG coding interviews are hard enough. But now more than ever, systems design questions are becoming a standard part of their interview process.

Companies like Google and Facebook are unforgiving. They want you to prove your knowledge of complex, large-scale systems that are maintainable and reliable.

Interviewer: Design Netflix.

Interviewee: Oh… Um… okay. Let me just get organized here.

How do you even begin to tackle that?

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SystemsExpert vs Grokking the System Design Interview: Comparison

Both courses were created by people that have worked at various FAANG-level companies.

SystemsExpert is a video-based, highly-interactive course. It was created by Clément Mihailescu (ex-Google, ex-Facebook) and Antoine Pourchet (ex-Uber).

And Grokking the System Design Interview is a text-based course with ample media-rich examples. It was created by hiring managers from Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Amazon.

Now let’s take a glace at some basic similarities and differences between the two courses:

	Grokking the System Design Interview	SystemsExpert
Level	Beginner	Advanced
Course Style	Text-based	Video-based
Lessons	31	25
Playgrounds	2	0
Interactive Workspace	No	Yes
Code Snippets	22	16
Illustrations	102	in-video
Problems	15	13
Glossary	Yes	Yes
Developed by FAANG employees	Current	Former
Cost	~$79 for course, $250 for platform	~$79 for course, $139 for platform

And now let’s take a closer look at what SystemsExpert and Grokking the System Design Interview have to offer…

SystemsExpert

SystemsExpert is updated regularly with new questions, features and more.

It’s separated into 2 sections: Systems Design Fundamentals and Hand-Picked Questions.

1. Systems Design Fundamentals

You’ll start the SystemsExpert course by watching videos on 25 modules. Each covers a specific concept:

🔷 Leader Election 🔷 Peer-to-Peer Networks 🔷 Configuration

🔷 Hashing 🔷 Load Balancers 🔷 Replication and Sharding

🔷 Polling and Streaming 🔷 Rate Limiting 🔷 MapReduce

🔷 Client-Server Model 🔷 Storage 🔷 Network Protocols

🔷 Logging and Monitoring 🔷 Publish/Subscribe Pattern

🔷 Key-Value Stores 🔷 Relational Databases 🔷 Proxies

🔷 Latency and Throughput 🔷 Caching 🔷 Availability

And more.

Each module contains a video explanation of a systems design concept.

And it’s accompanied by a list of key terms you should be familiar with.

In addition, more difficult concepts include a code example for clarification.

The modules are organized to build upon concepts from previous modules.

2. Hand-Picked Questions

Each question is presented in the form of a mock interview, which is an effective method of interview preparation.

There are 13 hand-picked questions. And you’ll design:

⚛️ AlgoExpert ⚛️ Code-Deployment System ⚛️ Stockbroker

⚛️ Facebook News Feed ⚛️ Google Drive

⚛️ Netflix ⚛️ Reddit API ⚛️ Uber API

⚛️ Slack ⚛️ Airbnb

Each question is neatly organized in SystemsExpert’s dark mode 4-pane integrated workspace:

Prompt: Here is where you’ll see the interview question. In addition, you’ll see recommended clarifying questions to ask the interviewer.

Scratchpad: You can write down all notes in an HTML-enabled note-taking window.

Video Solution: This is where you’ll hear the mock interview take place. Clément asks the interviewer clarifying questions. And from there, he writes and draws out solutions as if an actual interview was taking place.

Solution Walkthrough: This list of walkthroughs is used to clarify the explanations in the video. Plus, these are great as a reference point when revisiting the question.

And as if that wasn’t enough, there’s an expandable glossary with about 100 key terms you can easily reference throughout these systems design questions.

New! SystemsExpert now has a 50-question quiz and a systems design certificate.

💰 Cost:

You can get SystemsExpert for about $79 for an annual subscription.

Or you can buy the SystemsExpert & AlgoExpert bundle for about $139 for an annual subscription.

Check out SystemsExpert here. 🚨 Use coupon code realtoughcandy at checkout and save 10%. 🚨

Want to know more? Check out our full SystemsExpert review.

Grokking the System Design Interview

In contrast to SystemsExpert, Grokking the System Design Interview is geared towards engineers in the earlier stages of systems design.

In addition to a thorough explanation of fundamentals, they also recommend various resources to get more in depth with key concepts. And from there you can graduate to navigating systems design problems.

The course is separated into two sections: System Design Problems and Glossary of System Design Basics.

1. System Design Problems

System Design problems include:

🟢 Web Crawler 🟢 Facebook’s Newsfeed 🟢 Ticketmaster

🟢 Dropbox 🟢 Facebook Messenger 🟢 API Rate Limiter

🟢 YouTube 🟢 Typeahead Suggestion 🟢 Twitter Search

🟢 Uber backend 🟢 Yelp 🟢 Nearby Friends 🟢 Netflix

🟢 URL shortening service 🟢 Pastebin 🟢 Instagram

Each section is broken down into multiple parts using:

🔻 text explanations 🔻 code snippets 🔻 illustrations 🔻 playgrounds

For example, let’s look at Web Crawler.

You’ll learn:

✔️ what a web crawler is

✔️ requirements and goals of the system

✔️ design considerations

✔️ capacity estimation and constraints

✔️ high level design

✔️ detailed component design

✔️ fault tolerance

✔️ data partitioning

✔️ crawler traps

And more.

2. Glossary of System Design Basics

This section covers:

🟣 Key Characteristics of Distributed Systems 🟣 Load Balancing

🟣 Caching 🟣 Data Partitioning 🟣 Indexes 🟣 Proxies

🟣 Long-Polling vs WebSockets vs Server-Sent Events

🟣 Redundancy and Replication 🟣 SQL vs. NoSQL

🟣 CAP Theorem 🟣 Consistent Hashing

Here you’ll find extensive explanations and uses for each concept.

For example, Load Balancing looks at:

• benefits of load balancing
• load balancing algorithms
• redundant load balancers
• backend health check methods

And more.

New in October 2020!
SystemsExpert now has a 50-question quiz and a systems design certificate.

💰 Cost:

You can buy the Grokking the System Design Interview course for about $79 for lifetime access.

Or get complete access to over 150 courses and learning tracks on the Educative platform for about $21 per month.

Check out Grokking the System Design Interview here.

SystemsExpert vs Grokking the System Design Interview: Conclusion

We recommend taking SystemsExpert and Grokking the System Design Interview when preparing for your systems design interview.

With the expansive resources available on Grokking the System Design Interview, you’ll build a strong foundation of fundamentals.

Plus there are plenty of systems design questions for you to work on. But the lack of mock interview scenarios is something this course is lacking.

However, the questions on SystemsExpert are all mock interview scenarios. And with their refresher of key terms and concepts, it’s a well-rounded course.

So our SystemsExpert vs Grokking the System Design Interview recommendation: Prepare for your systems design interview using both SystemsExpert and Grokking the System Design Interview.

Up Next: Is AlgoExpert worth it in 2020? [AlgoExpert.io review]