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What is this?
A free, visual collection of short explainers and cheat sheets covering core system design concepts (APIs, databases, caching, message queues, real-world company architectures) to help you understand how production systems work and prepare for system design interviews.
Is this a structured course or a loose collection of diagrams?
It's a continuously growing collection of standalone illustrated write-ups and cheat sheets, not a linear course with exercises — each linked topic is a one-page visual explanation you can read independently.
Does this replace hands-on interview practice?
No — it's purely visual reference material and cheat sheets, not mock interviews or coding exercises; it points to 'Recommended Materials for Technical Interviews' rather than providing practice problems itself.
Can I reuse these diagrams in my own blog or course?
The repository's license is marked as NOASSERTION, meaning there's no clearly stated open license for reuse, so you should check with ByteByteGo before republishing the diagrams.
Does it cover real company architectures, or just theory?
Both — alongside theoretical explainers it has a dedicated case-studies section on Netflix, Uber, Airbnb, Twitter, Discord, Meta, Reddit, and others showing how they solved real scaling problems.
What is ByteByteGo?
ByteByteGo is the brand/newsletter behind this repo that publishes visual system design content; this repository is their open companion collection of diagrams and short explainers.
What are similar projects?
awesome-system-design-resources, architect-awesome, system-design-academy, system-design-interview, awesome-scalability, tech-interview-handbook, system-design, awesome-software-architecture
Which topics is it in?
system-design-interview, coding-interviews, software-development, cloud-computing, diagram, software-architecture, software-engineering, kafka, system-design, interview-questions, graphql, caching