SYSTEM DESIGNDesign a URL Shortener (Bitly)BitlyGoogle
TRAFFIC LEVEL
—/3
CONSTRAINTS
Write RPS100
Read RPS10,000
Read/Write Ratio100:1
Data (5 yr)~1.5 TB
URL length7 chars (base62)
Compute & Network
Load BalancerDistribute traffic
API GatewayEntry point / auth
API ServerBusiness logic
Worker NodeAsync processing
CDN EdgeGlobal cache
WebSocket GatewayPersistent connections
Data Stores
PostgreSQLRelational DB
MySQLRelational DB
CassandraWide-Column DB
DynamoDBNoSQL / Managed
S3 BucketObject storage
Queues & Cache
Redis CacheIn-memory store
KafkaEvent stream
ZookeeperCoordination
Specialized
Bloom FilterProbabilistic set
Rate LimiterThrottling
Geohash ServiceGeospatial index
Trie ServerPrefix search
APNS / FCMPush notifications
AggregatorBatch / roll-up
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🚨 INCIDENT
BitlyGoogle

Design a system that takes long URLs and generates 7-character short links. It must handle 10,000 Read RPS and 100 Write RPS, and survive datacenter failures.

📥 Assigned to:You — Mid Engineer
SCALE LEVELS
1
500 RPS
Target: <30ms
2
2,000 RPS
Target: <80ms
3
11,000 RPS
Target: <480ms
GLOBAL SUCCESS RATE
100.0%
P99 LATENCY
45ms
Target: < 200ms
TOTAL RPS INGESTED0 / 11,000
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