Carousel template for engineering posts: the 7-slide structure that works

A free, slide-by-slide template for turning an engineering blog post, postmortem or architecture write-up into a LinkedIn carousel. Each slide has one job, a headline pattern and the visual that fits it, shown on a real carousel made from Stripe's post on online migrations.

Updated 7 October 2026 · by the team behind Chartin

The template at a glance

Most carousel templates are built for tips and listicles. Engineering posts need a different shape: the reader has to understand how a system works before the fix makes sense, and the diagram does most of the explaining. This structure tells one story across seven slides, and each slide answers the question the previous one raised.

The example carousel, slides 1 to 7. Stripe's original article.

Slide by slide, with a real example

The example follows one thing, a single subscription, through the whole story. Picking one concrete thing to follow (a request, a row, a deploy) is the easiest way to keep seven slides connected.

SLIDE 1 OF 7

The hook

Name the company or system and say what happened, in plain words. Promise the answer the deck delivers.

Headline pattern

[Company] [did something surprising]. [The result that makes it hard to believe].

Visual

A cover illustration or the one number that matters, plus 2 or 3 fact chips.

In the example

"Stripe moved hundreds of millions of live billing records. Zero downtime." Three chips back it up, and one line tells the reader what to follow: "Follow one subscription through the switch."

Avoid

A teaser question with no subject ("Ever wondered how databases scale?"). The reader scrolls past.

SLIDE 2 OF 7

The setup

Show how the system works on a normal day, before anything breaks or changes. Readers can't follow a fix to a system they've never seen.

Headline pattern

[The system] [works like this], so [the consequence that sets up the problem].

Visual

A simple diagram of the parts and what moves between them.

In the example

"Subscriptions lived inside the customer record, so every change rewrote the whole thing", with a diagram of a customer record holding its subscriptions.

Avoid

Skipping straight to the fix. Without the setup, the clever part reads as jargon.

SLIDE 3 OF 7

The problem

Say what made this hard: the constraint, the failure, or the number that forced a change.

Headline pattern

[Why the obvious fix was impossible], and [what was at stake].

Visual

A big number, a short list of constraints, or a chart of the symptom.

In the example

"Pausing billing was never an option, and a wrong row meant a wrong charge", under a large "3+ yrs" and three constraints.

Avoid

Stating the problem without the stakes. Say what users would have seen or lost.

SLIDE 4 OF 7

The mechanism, step 1

Start the explanation. One idea per slide: the first move the team made, and why it works.

Headline pattern

[The team] [did the first step], then [the next part].

Visual

A flow or numbered steps that follow one concrete thing through the system.

In the example

"Stripe wrote every change to both tables, then filled in history offline", as a three-step flow.

Avoid

Cramming the whole architecture onto one slide. Split it.

SLIDE 5 OF 7

The mechanism, step 2

The clever part: the step that makes the approach safe, fast or correct.

Headline pattern

[The team] [did the clever thing] but [the safeguard].

Visual

A diagram where the important path is visibly different from the rest (highlighted, or marked as not reaching users).

In the example

"Stripe read both tables but served users only the old answer", with the shadow read drawn below a production boundary it never crosses.

Avoid

Describing the clever part in words only. This is the slide people screenshot, so draw it.

SLIDE 6 OF 7

The result

Show what changed: before and after, the measured outcome, or the switch itself.

Headline pattern

[What the team could now do], [the outcome in numbers if the article gives them].

Visual

Before and after side by side, or the headline numbers.

In the example

"Verified reads let Stripe move writes, then reads, to the new table", as a before and after.

Avoid

Numbers the article doesn't state, and dropped qualifiers ("35x" when the post says "up to 35x").

SLIDE 7 OF 7

The takeaway

Answer the question slide 1 raised in one line, then give two or three lessons the reader can use.

Headline pattern

[The principle, in one sentence].

Visual

Two or three numbered lessons, each with a short line of detail.

In the example

"Prove the new path live before you serve it", then three lessons: migrate in stages, shadow-read before you switch, scan for stragglers offline.

Avoid

Generic advice ("Communication is key"). The lesson should only make sense after this story.

Copy the template

Paste this into your notes or design tool and fill in the brackets from the article. Write all seven headlines first: read on their own, in order, they should tell the whole story.

SLIDE 1 · HOOK
Headline: [Company] [did something surprising]. [The result that makes it hard to believe].
Subtitle: Follow [one concrete thing] through [the system / the incident].
Chips: [number from the article] · [number] · [number]

SLIDE 2 · SETUP
Headline: [The system] [works like this], so [the consequence that sets up the problem].
Visual: the parts of the system and what moves between them.

SLIDE 3 · PROBLEM
Headline: [Why the obvious fix was impossible], and [what was at stake].
Visual: the big number, the constraints, or the symptom users saw.

SLIDE 4 · MECHANISM, STEP 1
Headline: [The team] [did the first step], then [the next part].
Visual: a flow that follows one concrete thing.

SLIDE 5 · MECHANISM, STEP 2
Headline: [The team] [did the clever thing] but [the safeguard].
Visual: the important path drawn differently from the rest.

SLIDE 6 · RESULT
Headline: [What the team could now do], [the outcome, with the article's own qualifiers].
Visual: before and after, or the headline numbers.

SLIDE 7 · TAKEAWAY
Headline: [The principle, in one sentence].
1. [Lesson]: [one line of detail]
2. [Lesson]: [one line of detail]
3. [Lesson]: [one line of detail]

Footer on every slide: [Company] · [Article title]
In the post: a link to the original article.

Versions for incidents, migrations and performance posts

The seven jobs stay the same; what fills them changes with the kind of post.

Incident or postmortem

Hook with the impact (what broke, for how long). Setup: how the system normally works. Problem: the symptom users saw. Mechanism: the root cause, then the response. Result: what changed after. Takeaway: the lesson other teams can apply.

1. 1Hook
   One change, and how much went down for how long
2. 2Setup
   How changes normally ship
3. 3Symptom
   What users and dashboards saw
4. 4Root cause
   Why it happened, drawn
5. 5Response
   The timeline of the fix
6. 6What changed
   The follow-up work
7. 7Lesson
   One principle and 2 or 3 practices

Migration or architecture change

Hook with the scale and the constraint ("zero downtime"). Setup: the old design. Problem: why it had to change. Mechanism: the migration steps, one or two per slide. Result: the cutover. Takeaway: the pattern.

1. 1Hook
   What moved, how much, and the constraint
2. 2Old design
   How it worked before
3. 3Why change
   The limit it hit
4. 4Step 1
   The first move
5. 5Step 2
   The safeguard
6. 6Cutover
   Before and after
7. 7Pattern
   The reusable lesson

Performance or scaling win

Hook with the result and the surprise in it. Setup: where the time or cost went. Problem: the bottleneck, measured. Mechanism: the change. Result: the numbers, with the article's own qualifiers. Takeaway: how to find the same bottleneck.

1. 1Hook
   The win and the surprise
2. 2Setup
   Where the time went
3. 3Bottleneck
   Measured, as a chart or timeline
4. 4The fix
   What changed, drawn
5. 5Why it works
   The mechanism
6. 6Result
   The article's numbers
7. 7Lesson
   How to spot it in your system

An incident carousel made with the first version, from Cloudflare's write-up of its July 2019 outage:

Size, text and design rules

• Size: 1080 × 1350 pixels, a 4:5 portrait. It fills the most screen on a phone.
• Format: export one PDF and post it as a LinkedIn document; each page becomes a slide.
• Words: about 32 words of headline, subtitle and caption per slide, and under 65 in total including diagram labels.
• Headlines: complete sentences that say who did what. At most one question in the whole deck.
• Text size: nothing smaller than about 22 pixels on a 1080-pixel-wide slide. Check it on your phone before posting.
• Diagrams: one idea per diagram. An arrow means something moves along it, so label what. Work that runs in parallel isn't drawn as one more step in a chain.
• Jargon: explain a term where it first appears, or describe it by what it does. Keep a company's internal names to one or two.
• Credit: the company and article title in the footer of every slide.

Accuracy checklist before you post

Engineers will spot a wrong detail in seconds, and a confident mistake about someone else's system is the fastest way to lose them. Most errors in technical carousels aren't wrong numbers; they're right numbers with the wrong words around them.

• Every number is in the articleSearch the post for each figure on your slides. If you rounded or derived one, say so.
• Qualifiers survive"Up to 35x", "about", "by default", "in internal benchmarks": if the article hedges a number, your slide does too.
• Tense matchesIs it shipped, being rolled out, or planned? "Migrated" and "is migrating" are different claims.
• The right subject"Billions of agent commits" is wrong if the article counts developers and agents together.
• The mechanism is rightA push moves a branch to a new commit; the branch name doesn't change. Have someone who knows the system read the mechanism slides.
• No word stronger than the source"Never", "always", "stateless", "instant": each needs the article to say it.
• Examples are labelledA made-up request ID or timestamp gets a small "illustrative" note where it first appears.
• Quotes are word for wordAnd attributed to the person the article names.
• The source is creditedName the company and article on every slide (a footer line works) and link it in the post.

FAQ

Skip the template

Chartin follows this structure for you. Paste a link to an engineering article: it reads the whole post, lets you pick the story and the audience, draws the diagrams from the article's facts, tests the slides on a reader who never saw the article, and checks every line against the source before you see it. See carousels it has made, or how it compares with other carousel makers.