Comparison

Systematic FYI vs System Design Arcade

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Systematic FYI

Features
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Review key concepts with a simple system design flashcard app for your system design interview. This app includes three sets of flashcards focused on common interview questions, patterns, and tradeoffs. It’s designed to help you build intuition for system design interviews at FAANG companies like Google, Meta, Amazon, and other top tech firms. Ideal for software engineers preparing for interviews or brushing up on architecture fundamentals. No extra features or distractions—just system design flashcard practice. Privacy Policy: https://www.systematic.fyi/privacy Terms of Service: https://www.systematic.fyi/terms

About

System Design Arcade

Learn complex system design concepts through engaging, bite-sized arcade-style games. Master building blocks, design full systems, and practice with real infrastructure tools. Progress is saved locally and no account is required.

Highlights
  • Arcade-style mini-games for system design concepts
  • End-to-end system design challenges
  • Hands-on drills with infrastructure tools
  • Narrative-driven story mode
  • Varied challenge types (multiple choice, puzzles, builder)
  • Daily challenges with streak tracking
  • Offline progress saving
Features
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NEW: THE AI ARCADE. Eight games on the system design round that didn't exist three years ago: RAG, LLM serving, embeddings, guardrails, and GPU fleets. Free, no subscription, and it plays offline. The system design interview is the one where the whiteboard goes blank. You've read the books. You've watched the videos. But when the interviewer says "design Instagram," or now "design a retrieval system for our support bot," you freeze, because reading about consistent hashing at 2am is not the same as knowing it cold. System Design Arcade is the fix. It turns every building block into 60-second arcade levels you can actually finish. On the subway. In line for coffee. While waiting for CI. On a plane with no Wi-Fi. THE AI ARCADE AI engineering is its own interview round now, and most prep hasn't caught up. The AI Arcade drills the systems behind it: - Design a RAG System: chunk boundaries, hybrid retrieval, reranking, and the permission bug that ends careers - LLM Serving: batching, KV caches, streaming, and GPU memory as the binding constraint - Feed Ranking: retrieval, ranking, and the feedback loop that decides what a model can ever learn - Embeddings: what "similar" means, how many dimensions you need, and migrating models without silent breakage - Feature Stores: one definition, two readers, and point-in-time correctness between training and serving - ML Observability: catching a model that is wrong while every dashboard stays green - AI Guardrails: where the checks sit, prompt injection from untrusted text, and what a model is allowed to reach - GPU Infrastructure: memory, interconnect, scheduling, and the bill FIVE TRACKS, ONE CURRICULUM Concept Arcade: master one building block at a time. Caches, databases, queues, replication, sharding, load balancing. Problem Arcade: design complete systems end to end. URL Shortener, Rate Limiter, News Feed, Chat, Ride Sharing, and a new Key-Value Store. The classics, played out like boss fights. Tool Arcade: hands-on drills with the infrastructure you'll use on the job. Redis. Kafka. Docker. Kubernetes. And Vector Vault, the vector store behind semantic search. AI Arcade: the eight games above. Story Mode: narrative capstones that walk an onsite round end to end: a Twitter-style home timeline, a chat system, Dropbox, typeahead search, a rate limiter, and a URL shortener. CHALLENGE TYPES THAT DON'T FEEL LIKE FLASHCARDS Multiple choice, ordering puzzles, fill-in-the-blank, API Builder, Architecture Builder, and Scenario-Why drills. Each level mixes formats so your brain has to actually engage. The Scenario-Why drills train the reasoning behind the answer, not just the answer. REVIEW THAT SPACES ITSELF OUT Miss a challenge and it comes back in Power-Up Review. Clear it and it returns on a widening schedule, so what you learn stays learned. DAILY CHALLENGE A fresh challenge every day, the same one for you and your study buddy. Streak counter. Optional reminder notifications, opt in from Settings. BUILT FOR YOUR EYES Retro arcade aesthetic by default. Pixel fonts. Neon glow. Prefer something softer? Switch to the playful sticker-card vibe, or open the Theme Lab and tune background, glow, gradient, and font until it feels right. Read Aloud narrates every explanation, so you can learn while you walk. YOUR PROGRESS STAYS YOURS Start playing instantly: Level 1 of every game needs no account. A free sign-in with Apple, Google, GitHub, or email unlocks every level and backs up your progress across your iPhone and iPad. Progress saves on your device. We use product analytics to see which levels need work, never the content of your answers. FREE TO PLAY No ads. No paywalls. No subscription. Every level is free with a free account. New games ship every sprint. Start with Level 1.

Screenshots

Systematic FYI3 screens
System Design Arcade4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: System Design Arcade at none against Systematic FYI's 1. Systematic FYI's advantage is update cadence (every 5 days vs fortnightly). On price, ads, device support and iOS requirement there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Systematic FYI sells 1 in-app purchase, starting at $3.99 per month. System Design Arcade asks for nothing beyond the download.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Systematic FYI ships an update every 5 days, System Design Arcade fortnightly. The most recent releases landed on October 7, 2026 and October 17, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard2 real differences · 8 level
Systematic FYI versus System Design Arcade: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterSystematic FYISystem Design Arcade
PriceFreeFree
Rating—5.0 (9 ratings) — better
Positive reviews—100.0% of reviews
Number of ratings—9 — better
Update frequencyEvery 5 days — betterFortnightly
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
Monetization—Free
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS15.115.1
Further details — not scored
Size30 MB38 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperWilliam PrinHarsha Hassan Somashekara

In-app purchases

1 purchases

Systematic FYI

Subscriptions1
  • Systematic Premium$3.991 Month
None

System Design Arcade

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Systematic FYI free?
Systematic FYI is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is System Design Arcade free?
System Design Arcade is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do Systematic FYI or System Design Arcade have ads?
Neither Systematic FYI nor System Design Arcade shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Systematic FYI or System Design Arcade?
Systematic FYI ships an update every 5 days, and System Design Arcade fortnightly. Most recently, Systematic FYI was updated on October 7, 2026 and System Design Arcade on October 17, 2026.

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