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Hacktoberfest Weekend Challenge Contest Rules

Contest Announcement

Hacktoberfest Weekend Challenge: Build for a Friend

Sponsored by Major League Hacking PBC Inc("Sponsor")

NO ENTRY FEE. NO PURCHASE NECESSARY TO ENTER OR WIN. VOID WHERE PROHIBITED.

We urge you to carefully read the terms and conditions of this Contest Landing Page located here and the Major League Hacking PBC Inc General Contest Official Rules located here ("Official Rules"), incorporated herein by reference. The following contest specific details on this Contest Announcement Page, together with the Official Rules, govern your participation in the named contest defined below (the "Contest").

Sponsor does not claim ownership rights in your Entry. The Official Rules describe the rights you give to Sponsor by submitting an Entry to participate in the named Contest. In the event of a conflict between the terms of this Contest Announcement Page and the Official Rules, the Official Rules will govern and control.

Contest Name: Hacktoberfest Weekend Challenge: Build for a Friend
Entry Period: The Contest begins on October 2, 2026 at 2:00 AM UTC and ends on October 5, 2026 at 6:59 AM UTC (the "Entry Period")

How to Enter: All entries must be submitted no later than the end of the Entry Period. You may enter the Contest during the Entry Period as follows:

  1. Visit the Contest webpage part of the DEV Community Site located here (the "Contest Page"); and
  2. Follow any instructions on the Contest Page and submit your completed entry (each an "Entry").

You may submit one (1) Entry during the Entry Period. In the event that a participant submits more than one Entry, only the first Entry submitted will be considered for judging.

Required Elements for Entries: Without limiting any terms of the Official Rules, each Entry must include, at a minimum, the following elements:

  • A published submission post on DEV that uses the submission template and unique challenge tag (#hf26challenge) provided on the Contest Page.
  • A new project built during the Entry Period with open-source AI at its core, such as an open-weight model, an open-source agent harness or framework, or local inference.
  • A project that addresses the Contest theme, "Build for a Friend," by solving a real problem for a friend or loved one.
  • A demo of the project (deployed link or video) and a link to the project's code.
  • An explanation of why open-source AI matters for the project.

Pull requests to existing projects are not eligible Entries.

Judging Criteria: All qualified entries will be judged by a panel as selected by Sponsor as set forth in the Official Rules.

Judges will award one (1) Overall Winner and one (1) winner in each of the sixteen (16) prize categories listed below based on the following criteria:

  • Writing Quality (weighted most heavily)
  • Relevance to the Prompt and Theme
  • Creativity
  • Technical Execution
  • Use of Partner Technology (prize category entries only)

In the event of a tie in scoring between judges, the judges will select the entry that received the highest number of positive reactions on their DEV post to determine the winner.

Each Entry is automatically eligible for the Overall Winner prize and every prize category it qualifies for. Participants are limited to one (1) win per Contest.

Prize(s):

The prizes to be awarded from the Contest are as follows:

Overall Winner (1) will receive:

  • $250 USD
  • DEV++ Membership
  • Exclusive DEV Badge

Featured Partner Category Winners (6), one (1) winner for each of the following categories: Best Use of Render, Best Use of TabPFN, Best Use of Tinker, Best Use of Arduino, Best Use of DigitalOcean, and Best Use of Gemma. Each will receive:

  • $200 USD
  • Exclusive DEV Badge

Partner Category Winners (10), one (1) winner for each of the following categories: Best Use of Backboard, Best Use of ElevenLabs, Best Use of Entire, Best Use of GitHub Copilot, Best Use of Mastra, Best Use of MongoDB Atlas, Best Use of SerpApi, Best Use of Sentry Agent Tracing, Best Use of Temporal, and Best Use of Tiger Data. Each will receive:

  • $100 USD
  • Exclusive DEV Badge

Participant Winner (who submits a valid and qualified entry) will receive:

  • A completion badge on their DEV profile