, but their frequency and accessibility have definitely grown quite a bit recently. Earlier, they were mostly reserved for predictive machine learning problems (think Kaggle), but now, the main focus, not less than for my part, has shifted more towards constructing usable prototypes. Coding still matters, however the barrier to entry is lower, which suggests more people can participate. This is nice for each participants in addition to the businesses, since it opens up so many latest ways to make use of their tools.
To profit from this, I’ve spent the past six months joining different hackathons organised by Gradio, Kaggle, Gemini, OpenAI, and more. I’ve had all types of outcomes: top-3 finishes in just a few, consolation prizes in others, some results still pending, just a few where I didn’t even make the cut, and a pair where I couldn’t finish in time to submit. But no matter the result, each hackathon has been an ideal learning experience and in this text, I share a few of my reflections and takeaways from the journey, in no particular order.
1. Every idea starts small
An idea is fragile at first. It must be nurtured and desires time to grow. At first ideas may appear messy, too wide and possibly too easy. Nevertheless as you spend more time, iterate on them, you’ll see them slowly converging to something meaningful and workable.
I at all times thought that there may be an a-ha! moment and also you get ideas via some inspiration. In point of fact, it takes loads of effort to go from a basic form to something that might be worked upon and that’s the great thing about ideation. Most of the time, the ultimate product looks quite a bit different than the primary sketch and truthfully, I enjoy this ideation phase even greater than the submission, because that’s when creativity comes alive.
This phase jogs my memory of the Double Diamond model from the Design Council which shows two stages of the design process:
- The primary diamond: (understanding the issue)
- The second diamond: (creating and refining solutions)
2. The 80/20 Rule
In the joy of submission, it’s easy to get straight into coding. I’ve done this myself. Once, I rushed ahead with an concept that felt exciting, only to understand halfway that it wasn’t realistic and didn’t even fit the theme. Because it was a weekend hackathon, I had already lost crucial time.
What I’ve learned is straightforward: spend 80% of your time upfront considering and validating your idea, so the construct takes only 20%. This protects you from loads of wasted effort and painful rework.
3. Keep It Easy, Don’t Overcomplicate
As Dieter Rams, the visionary designer, famously said,
Adding more features to your app might be great, and useful ones could make your product stand out, but sometimes we go too far, piling on an excessive amount of, and the product finally ends up distracting the user as an alternative of helping them. There may be also a term for this called Feature Bloat.
Take, as an example, the standard TV distant. It has so many buttons and we don’t even use half of them. I mean, why include stuff that will not be usable and takes up a lot space? As an alternative, keeping only the most-used and essential buttons can reduce clutter and make the distant much more useful.
The tweet below nicely encapsulates my very own thoughts in a really subtle manner. While its easier to create features today, because of AI assistance, ensure that you employ that help to construct something meaningful as an alternative of just slop.
4. Don’t neglect the code
Putting together code today is simpler than ever. With coding agents, you’ll be able to spin up a working app quickly, but writing code that’s clean, readable, and protected continues to be a skill. In the event you’re aiming to show your hackathon project into something production-ready, that you must review your code yourself. I’ve seen people hardcode API keys or ignore basic security practices simply to . That’s nice for a fast demo, but dangerous beyond it as might be seen within the viral example below.
Matt Palmer from Replit has written a superb blog addressing this very problem. In his write-up on Secure Vibe Coding, he has captured the safety issues that include modern vibe coding. It’s definitely price a read.
Matt shares a practical security checklist and several other best practices to assist keep hackathon projects protected. As an example, he emphasizes the necessity to keep dependencies updated, since most vulnerabilities arise from outdated libraries. He also stresses proper error handling to avoid exposing sensitive details in error messages. Cookies ought to be secured and for file uploads, he recommends validating file types and sizes and scanning for any malicious content. Lastly, he advises implementing rate limiting on all API endpoints, especially those related to authentication. The figure below is tailored from his blog itself.
5. Think Like a Product Person
Most hackathons today don’t just ask for a working prototype. Additionally they expect a project write-up and a brief demo video that appears skilled. This implies that you must deal with every aspect of your project, from ideation to final presentation, very like a product person. Coding is very important, but it surely’s not the one consideration. Your use case and the way your project delivers value matter just as much. You’re not only defining the issue but in addition fascinated about the user journey and the way your product solves that specific need.
As an example, the Gemma 3n Impact Challenge, which went survive Kaggle earlier this 12 months, required participants to incorporate a video demo, a technical write-up, a public repository with the code, and a live demo of the hosted project as a part of their submission. And trust me, creating professional-quality videos isn’t easy.
That’s why it’s essential to plan time for presentation. I normally record videos, edit them, add captions, and even do a voice-over. It takes effort, but should you’ve worked hard in your idea, showing it well is just as necessary as constructing it. Here’s my team’s attempt at creating the video presentation for the Gemma 3n Impact Challenge.
6. Go searching for inspiration
The very best hackathon projects solve real problems. Start by observing actual pain points around you and ask yourself what feature you had at all times wanted that didn’t exist yet.
In these hackathons, your first are the judges, so it helps to think from their perspective. As an example, I participated on this 12 months’s Meta Kaggle Hackathon, where Kaggle provided 15 years of information for the community to research and uncover trends and insights that could possibly be useful. For this challenge, I approached the information from Kaggle’s standpoint and tried to grasp what signals matter most for his or her community growth and whether Kaggle’s recent efforts were helping revive engagement.
My submission, which earned second prize, focused on why many community members go silent after joining and what might be done to reactivate them I consider this addresses an actual pain point not just for Kaggle but for a lot of other tech communities, and I’m glad it resonated with the judges.
Social media also serves as an ideal source of inspiration. On platforms like X or Reddit, individuals are very vocal about what frustrates them. While there may be loads of noise, if we’re capable of sift the signals, we will have ideas that could possibly be become impactful solutions. If you deal with solving an actual, specific problem, the answer often finally ends up helping a much wider audience.
7. Create an Idea Bank
Ideas don’t wait for hackathons and inspirations can strike anytime. Subsequently As an alternative of letting them slip away, create a straightforward idea bank to capture them. It doesn’t need to be fancy. An easy notes app, a Notion page or perhaps a spreadsheet works equally well. The purpose is to store every spark in order that when a hackathon comes around, you’re not ranging from zero.
It’s also necessary to frequently organize your ideas. As David Allen emphasizes in his writing on capturing good ideas, it’s not enough to only have the tools; you furthermore mght need the habit of organizing them later. He notes, “In the event you leave emails unprocessed in your inbox, or paper notes piled up in a briefcase or notepad somewhere, the entire process is defeated, and your motivation to proceed will disappear.”
By constructing this habit, you’ll have already got a pool of ideas able to refine, adapt, and construct on.
8. Selecting the Right Hackathons to Join
While hackathons are fun, it’s just as necessary to know which of them to skip. At first, I signed up for nearly every event I got here across. At one point, I ended up doing 4 back-to-back hackathons, two that lasted two months each and two weekend sprints. It was exciting, but exhausting, and I burned out quickly.
Now I’m more selective about where I invest my time and energy. Picking the best hackathons means you’ll be able to focus higher, construct stronger projects, and truly benefit from the process as an alternative of running yourself into the bottom.
9. Share your work with the world
Making a working app takes real effort, so each time you’ll be able to, share it with the community and there’s no higher place than X to do this. Showcase your project to the world, whether it wins or not. You never know who might find it useful or whose problem it would solve. Sharing openly also helps you get feedback so that you would be able to proceed to enhance upon your idea. Who knows, you would possibly even find yourself teaming up with someone on your next hackathon.
Final Thoughts and Finding Your Next Hackathon
Participating in these GenAI hackathons jogs my memory of machine learning competitions on Kaggle. If you first start, all the things feels overwhelming, but steadily you develop a set of best practices and a reliable toolkit you’ll be able to fall back on and adapt quickly. Over time, I’ve built a private toolbox that brings together constructing blocks and lessons from every competition I’ve taken part in.
So where to look for brand new hackathon announcements? The very best place is undoubtedly X and following the best people and communities can enable you to easily find them. Aside from that, platforms like Kaggle, Devpost and dev.to are also some great places to search for upcoming events.
In the event you’ve made it this far, I’m genuinely glad you probably did. Hope you bought your day by day dose of motivation and are ready for some hacking. All the perfect!
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