Design
Distributed Unique ID Generator (Snowflake-like)
Design a service that generates globally unique, roughly time-sortable IDs across many machines without coordination.
This is a Low-Level Design (LLD) problem. New to LLD vs HLD? Start here.
01 - Why interviewers ask this
It's the canonical "design Twitter Snowflake" question — interviewers check whether you understand how timestamp+machine-id+sequence bit-packing avoids any central coordination.
02 - Where this system exists in the real world
You interact with this design every day.
Twitter Snowflake-style distributed ID generation
Distributed database primary key generation
Order/transaction ID generation at scale
03 - What you'll master
Solve this once. Know it forever.
Bit-pack timestamp, machine ID, and sequence
Avoid central coordination for ID generation
Handle clock-drift edge cases correctly
04 - What you'll design
5 functional · 3 non-functional requirements.
Generate a unique ID with no central coordination required per request
4 more requirements inside
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05 - Companies that ask this
You may face this exact question in your next interview.
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