•SYSTEM DESIGN
Goldman Sachs System Design Questions
Every system design problem candidates reported at Goldman Sachs between September 2025 and September 2026, most-asked first. Each one links to a full solution.
Problems
8
Candidate reports
10
Asked more than once
2
start here
Question type
8 HLD
Topics Goldman Sachs tests
Design a notification system
Design a multi-channel notification service (push, email, SMS, in-app) that other services call to notify users. It must accept sudden bursts of millions of notifications with low acknowledgement latency, persist them durably,…
Also worded as: Design a notification service
Design a stock broker like Zerodha (+ LLD of order processing)
Design a stock trading or brokerage platform like Zerodha or Robinhood. Users view real-time quotes, place orders (market, limit, stop), see order status and fills, and view holdings and balances. Orders are validated (buying…
Also worded as: Simplified stock market: LLD extended to HLD
Design Pastebin
Design a Pastebin-like service where users paste text or code, receive a unique shareable link, and others can view it. Support optional expiry, public or unlisted visibility, and size limits (e.g., up to 10 MB). Expect a…
Design a portfolio management system (HLD + DB design)
Design a portfolio management system for investors or advisors: track holdings across accounts and asset classes, record transactions (buys, sells, dividends, transfers), compute positions, P&L, allocation and performance over…
Design a URL shortener
Design a URL shortening service like TinyURL or bit.ly. Users submit a long URL and get a short code (optionally a custom alias and expiry); visiting the short URL redirects to the original. Assume hundreds of millions of new…
Twitter home timeline (global + follower tweets)
Design the home feed of a social network like Instagram or Twitter. Users create posts (text, photos, video), follow other users, and open a personalized feed of recent posts from people they follow, possibly mixed with global or…
Design a rate limiter (code the leaky bucket)
Design a distributed rate limiter that protects APIs by limiting requests (or consumed units such as LLM billing tokens or storage quota) per user, API key, tenant, or IP. It must support configurable rules (e.g., 100…
Upload portal for internal users
Design a service that accepts large user uploads (files or product images, GBs in size), validates them, processes them asynchronously (virus scan, analysis, thumbnails, moderation), and makes results or approved assets available…
Duplicate reports of the same problem are merged and counted.
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What system design questions does Goldman Sachs ask?
Candidates reported 8 distinct system design problems at Goldman Sachs between September 2025 and September 2026, including Design a notification system, Design a stock broker like Zerodha (+ LLD of order processing), Design Pastebin.
How to prepare for Goldman Sachs system design interview?
Start with the Goldman Sachs problems reported most often, work through each full solution, then practice explaining a design end to end under time pressure in a mock interview.
What is the difference between HLD and LLD at Goldman Sachs?
HLD (High-Level Design) focuses on system architecture, scalability, and component interactions. LLD (Low-Level Design) dives into class diagrams, API contracts, and database schemas. Goldman Sachs tests both.