We're back with another DEV Weekend Challenge, a short bite-sized challenge planned to fit into your weekend. We know the submission window is tight, so we've set the timing to ensure that no matter where you are in the world, you'll have the majority of your Saturday and Sunday to participate.
International Dog Day is coming up on August 26, so this weekend we're handing the keyboard over to our best friends. 🐕
We'll select one overall winner and four prize category winners who utilize a specific technology as part of their challenge submission.
Let's get to it!
Prize Categories
Alongside our overall winner spot, we have four prize categories for participants who incorporate a specific technology into their project. You don't need to use any of these tools to be eligible for the overall winner spot, but if you're curious about any of the tech, this is a great excuse to give one a try.
- Best use of Snowflake
- Best use of Solana
- Best use of ElevenLabs
- Best use of Google AI
Pro Tip: since prize category winners are drawn from a smaller pool of submissions, your odds of taking home a prize are meaningfully higher.
Note: You may use multiple technologies in a single submission to qualify for multiple categories, but participants are limited to one win per challenge.
Judging Criteria
All submissions will be judged on the following:
- Relevance to Theme: Does the project clearly connect to the challenge theme?
- Creativity: Is the concept original or is it an interesting take on a familiar problem?
- Technical Execution: Is the project functional, well-built, and easy to use?
- Writing Quality: Is the submission post clearly written and engaging?
- Use of Prize Category Technology (optional): If pursuing a prize category, does the submission meaningfully incorporate the chosen technology?
Prizes
Five winners will each take home:
- $200 USD
- DEV++ Membership
- Exclusive DEV badge
All participants with a valid submission will receive a completion badge.
Need Help?
Check out our official challenge page for resources to help you get started with tech from our prize category partners.
Important Dates
- Launch Time: August 14, 2026 2:00 AM UTC
- Submissions Due: August 17, 2026 6:59 AM UTC
Here's what that looks like across a few timezones:
| Timezone | Launch Time (Local) | Submissions Due (Local) |
|---|---|---|
| PDT | Thursday, Aug 13 at 7:00 PM | Sunday, Aug 16 at 11:59 PM |
| EDT | Thursday, Aug 13 at 10:00 PM | Monday, Aug 17 at 2:59 AM |
| GMT | Friday, Aug 14 at 2:00 AM | Monday, Aug 17 at 6:59 AM |
| CEST | Friday, Aug 14 at 4:00 AM | Monday, Aug 17 at 8:59 AM |
| IST | Friday, Aug 14 at 7:30 AM | Monday, Aug 17 at 12:29 PM |
| JST | Friday, Aug 14 at 11:00 AM | Monday, Aug 17 at 3:59 PM |
| AEST | Friday, Aug 14 at 12:00 PM | Monday, Aug 17 at 4:59 PM |
Winners will be Announced on Thursday, September 10.
Questions about the challenge? Drop them in the comments below.
Good luck!!
Top comments (15)
Wof Wof :)
Good luck!
Seems like a fun challenge to take part in. I posted a entry for this event, my second ever Dev challenge , taking me out of my comfort zone of c# coding and back into html. Hopefully my submission is better than my "artwork" 😅
Feel free to have a quick try of my demo/game and upload a art submission, and let me know how it is. Goodluck to all participants of the challenge event,
😍
A dog-themed weekend challenge right before International Dog Day is
such a fun touch. The "one win per challenge but multiple category
eligibility" structure is a nice way to balance fairness with giving
people room to experiment with more than one prize tech.
Tight timeline (Fri to Mon) makes it feel approachable too, easy to
convince yourself "I'll just try something small" instead of overthinking
a huge project. Curious to see what people build with ElevenLabs for a
dog-themed submission, that's an interesting pairing.
Good luck to everyone participating!
🔗 Finally got to submit something for the Dog Days Edition! 🐾
Meet Tail Tales — you tell it your dog's name, breed, and one weird little habit they have, pick a genre, and Gemini writes a short story starring them, in their own voice. Tried to make each genre actually feel different — a thriller builds tension and lands a twist, heart-warming just slows down and sits in one soft moment.
Built it mostly to see if I could get an AI to write with real personality instead of generic filler — turned out to be the most fun part of the whole weekend.
🔗 dev.to/divya_saroja/tail-tales-tur...
Would genuinely love to hear what genre you'd pick for your own dog. Good luck to everyone else who built this weekend! 🐶
🐾 Sniffari — Every Walk Is an Adventure
Hi everyone! 👋
I just published my DEV Weekend Challenge: Dog Days Edition submission!
I built Sniffari, an AI-powered dog-walking adventure using Google Gemini for missions and photo validation, plus ElevenLabs to narrate the dog's final adventure story. 🐶✨
🔗 dev.to/a11en/sniffari-turning-dog-...
I'd love to hear your feedback. Good luck everyone! 🚀🐾
Cool idea. A bit late for me to start now, but I'm curious what others come up with.
Best use of those technologies?
Like, how do we get access to them?
Are we to pay for them?
great
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