HackHarvard is a 36-hour undergraduate hackathon hosted at Harvard University. Every year, over 500 students from around the world come to our campus to build, learn, and create.
Note — HackHarvard cannot provide overnight accommodations this year.
Prizes are awarded to each person on the team unless otherwise specified.
Healthcare · presented by Regeneron
Presented by Daytona
Daytona provides fast, secure sandboxes for running code, built for the era of AI agents. Give an AI agent a safe place to write and run code, spin up isolated development environments on demand, or build tools that execute untrusted code at scale. Daytona must be a meaningful part of how your project works; the most creative and effective use wins.
Presented by SpaceXAI
Space gives you more to work with than almost any other field: enormous public datasets, decades of missions, and a literature no human can read all of. Real space data goes in and a legendary project comes out.
Your project must be built with Cursor (the more you use it, the better your odds) and must use the Grok Imagine or Voice API. Bonus points for using Grok Bot for project planning and team collaboration.
Presented by Chalk
Build an agent that runs on real-world or contextual data, and prove it works. Chalk gives you the building blocks: sandboxes to run agent code, AI Gateway for model and MCP tool access, Federated Queries to pull data from where it lives, and Agent Evals to show your agent does what you claim.
Use any part of Chalk in your stack, as long as it does real work in your project. Judged on impact, use of data, and how rigorously you evaluate your agent. Get started at chalk.ai/hackharvard and find the Chalk team in our community Slack.
Presented by Factory
Droid is the coding agent behind Factory’s CLI, desktop app, and web platform. With the Droid SDK, it can run inside your own projects. Droid plans the steps, uses tools, edits files, and runs commands. You decide when it runs, what it can access, and what it builds. So what will your Droid do this weekend? Show us the most creative, useful, or ambitious thing you can build with it. Get started in TypeScript (npm install @factory/droid-sdk) or Python (pip install droid-sdk) with the docs at docs.factory.ai.
The project must use the Droid SDK (TypeScript or Python) in a meaningful way. Droid should do real work in the running product, not just help you write code. The repo README should explain where and how Droid is used.
Presented by Capital One
How will you reimagine banking? Nessie is Capital One’s REST API for hackathons. With simple HTTP requests, you can create customers, manage accounts, move money, check balances, access ATM and branch locations, and set up peer-to-peer transactions. Nessie is structured to resemble how Capital One actually runs things, so what you build here maps to the real world. Show us how you use Nessie in your project this weekend!
Presented by Photon
Build an agent that lives where people already talk. With Photon 2.0, your agent gets a real phone number and a native presence across iMessage, SMS, RCS, WhatsApp, Telegram, email and phone calls. Build companions that understand social context, multi-agent systems that collaborate with humans, or voice agents that answer and place real calls.
Projects must be built on Photon 2.0 and live on at least one Photon channel. Most creative and technically impressive agent wins. Join the hands-on build workshop Friday, 4–5 PM. Guidelines & docs
Presented by ASUS · Sustainability track bonus
Calling all content creators, vloggers and LinkedIn users! Share your experience building for the ASUS “Save the Earth” Sustainability Track on Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn or YouTube to win a prize (announced at the opening ceremony) and get reposted by official ASUS accounts. A 24-hour vlog, a short walkthrough of your build, a funny video about your team’s roles, a LinkedIn post on what you learned: make it fun, creative, informative, or all three.
Yellow · in-person attendance required
Have more questions? Contact us at [email protected]
A weekend-long building sprint where students team up to make software, hardware, art, tools, and experiments from scratch.
HackHarvard is open to undergraduate students. Teams can include students from different schools and experience levels.
The event is free for accepted hackers, including lunch, workshops, mentorship, and event programming. Lunch is available in limited quantities on a first-come, first-served basis for hackers at the venue, so we also recommend exploring the restaurants in Harvard Square and Allston.
Dinner will not be served at the venue due to various limitations and restrictions, and because hackers are not required to be at the venue during mealtimes. Lunch is provided in limited quantities to support hackers on-site during the daytime programming, and we order carefully to avoid food waste. We highly recommend exploring the restaurants Harvard Square and Allston have to offer.
You can form a team at the event. There will be time and space to meet other hackers before building begins.
Applications are closed. Late applications and requests to take another participant’s place are not guaranteed and will only be considered if space becomes available.
Applicants may contact the HackHarvard team with a substantive reason for reconsideration. Appeals are reviewed individually and do not guarantee admission.
See the full schedule for every talk, workshop and activity, Friday through Sunday.
Hacking officially begins after the opening ceremony at approximately 4:00 PM on Friday, October 16.
The opening ceremony takes place Friday from 3:00–4:00 PM. We strongly encourage all hackers to attend so they do not miss important event information.
Please contact the HackHarvard team as soon as possible if you expect to miss the 12:00–3:00 PM registration window. Late arrival may affect your ability to participate.
Yes. HackHarvard includes talks, workshops, sponsor activities, mentorship, and other programming. Friday evening features a Photon workshop, a talk from Tutor Intelligence CTO Alon Kosowsky-Sachs, a typeracing competition and trivia night with prizes. Saturday includes a sponsor fair in the morning, workshops from SpaceX AI and Daytona, talks on AI, startups, venture capital, and healthcare, and a Rubik’s cube tournament and poker tournament in the evening.
All projects must be submitted on Devpost by 8:00 AM on Sunday, October 18.
Judging takes place from 9:00 AM–12:00 PM on Sunday, October 18. Judges will complete training and debriefing from 8:00–9:00 AM.
After submissions close at 8:00 AM, judges evaluate projects from 9:00 AM–12:00 PM. Judges deliberate from 1:00–2:30 PM, and winners are announced during the closing ceremony.
Yes. Hackers need to be at the venue for judging (9:00 AM–12:00 PM) to demo their projects to judges, and for the closing ceremony (3:00–4:00 PM), where winners are announced.
The judge panel is currently full. Mentor opportunities may still be available.
Yes. Mentors may come and go during Friday and Saturday. The busiest building periods are generally Friday from 4:00–8:00 PM and Saturday from 12:00–8:00 PM.
HackHarvard does not currently provide travel reimbursement or lodging for mentors.
No. Our priority is providing lunch for hackers. We recommend exploring Harvard Square and Allston and the restaurants they have to offer, and we’re happy to give recommendations!
No. Judging for HackHarvard 2026 will take place in person.
No. The venue closes overnight, and overnight stays are not permitted. Participants must arrange their own accommodations and return the following day. Daily re-check-in is not required.
Participants are responsible for arranging their own accommodations for the duration of HackHarvard. While we are not able to offer housing this year, we encourage attendees to explore nearby hotels, hostels, or short-term rentals.
Travel reimbursement and financial aid are limited and are not guaranteed. Selected participants will receive separate communication with information about eligibility, amounts, covered expenses, and next steps. Participants should not assume funding will be available unless they receive confirmation.
to the moon and back
