Hacktoberfest Weekend Challenge 2026: Build for a Friend
DEV pays $250 for a new project that uses open source AI to help a real person. Submit on DEV by 5 October 2026.
The Hacktoberfest Weekend Challenge is the first of five DEV challenges in Hacktoberfest 2026. The theme is Build for a Friend. You build a new project with open source AI at its core, for one real person, and you write about it on DEV. Open source AI here means an open weight model, an open source agent framework, local inference, or a mix of those.
The overall winner receives $250, a DEV++ membership, and a winner badge. Each featured category pays $200, and each partner category pays $100. A submission can win only once in this challenge. Everyone with a valid submission gets a completion badge. Partner credits and promo codes are listed on the challenge page. Using a partner tool is optional for the overall prize.
Anyone 18 or older can enter. Teams of up to four people are allowed, and the team publishes one post. Prize money is not split by DEV, so a winning team splits it themselves. Submissions that are not in English can earn a completion badge, but they are not judged for prizes. The contest is void where prohibited.
The contest started at 2:00 a.m. UTC on 2 October 2026. Submissions are due at 6:59 a.m. UTC on 5 October 2026. You enter by publishing a post on DEV with the tags the page names. The project must be started and finished inside the window. Pull requests to existing projects do not count. Winners are announced the week of 5 October.
DEV says writing quality counts the most, then fit to the prompt and theme, creativity, and technical execution. Use of a partner technology is judged only if you enter that category. A strong project with a thin write up will not win.