2026 New Year Challenge - 5 Projects United Hackathon

2026 New Year Challenge - 5 Projects United Hackathon

Event Theme

The 2026 New Year Challenge is a global, collaborative hackathon jointly hosted by five leading AI projects. Running for 10 days, from Jan 8 to Jan 18, 2026 (PT), the event offers a total prize pool of $3,000.
Each project hosts its own independent track, covering diverse aspects of modern AI agent development, from memory management and automation to external integrations and deployment.
You can participate in multiple tracks simultaneously, and each track will be evaluated separately based on its own scoring.
Registration opens on Jan 8 at 00:00 PT. https://memu.pro/hackathon
Participants are welcome to join the event community in advance. https://discord.gg/KBMK8aEFkm

Organizers

MemU · OpenAgents · Sealos · TEN Framework · Zeabur

Event Timeline

One shared timeline for all challenges
Build Period

• Jan 8, 00:00 PT — Hackathon starts
• Jan 18, 00:00 PT — PR and project submissions close
• Jan 22 — Winners announced & payouts After the Build Review, judging, and result announcements follow after the build period. All five project challenges run within this shared timeframe. While the timeline is shared, each project runs its own judging and reward system.

Rewards & Scoring

Independent rewards for each project
Each project challenge defines its own:

• Reward structure
• Scoring or evaluation system
• Winner selection process There is no global leaderboard across all five projects. Your performance is evaluated only within the project challenges you join. 👉 See each project’s challenge page for detailed rules and rewards.

Challenge Tracks Overview

Five projects. Five challenges. Build in parallel.

MemU PR Hackathon
$600 prize pool · Community badge · MemU credits
Build the memory layer for next-gen AI agents.
Join a 10-day open-source PR hackathon and ship real contributions to MemU.
Fix bugs, add features, build integrations and contributor guides — every merged PR earns points, recognition, and lasting credit in the project.
🌟 Star MemU on GitHub: https://github.com/NevaMind-AI/memU

*OpenAgents *
$500 prize pool · Community badge
AI Agent Networks for Open Collaboration.
Join a 10-day open-source hackathon and ship real usecase contributions to OpenAgents.
We sincerely invite developers to build a practical, interesting and innovative Agent Network based on the OpenAgents platform, solve real-world problems with technology, and spark brand-new inspiration for innovation!
🌟 Star OpenAgents on GitHub:https://github.com/openagents-org/openagents

Sealos Run Wild Hackathon
Unlimited participation
Ready to ship? The Sealos Run Wild Hackathon is an online sprint for creators who want to see their apps alive. From Jan 8 to Jan 18, we are removing all limits. No PRs required. No complex tech stack restrictions.
You have two missions to choose from:
The Open Deployment Challenge: Deploy anything (games, tools, blogs) on Sealos.
The memU Integration Track: Build smart agents using memU and Sealos Devbox. Just chat with the Sealos desktop to deploy in seconds, and submit your Live Demo URL. We value finished products over prototypes. Winners get traffic, resources, and the spotlight they deserve.
🌟 Star Sealos on GitHub: https://github.com/labring/sealos

TEN Framework PR Hackathon
$600 prize pool
Join a 10-day open-source PR hackathon and ship real contributions to TEN Framework.
Fix bugs, add extensions, xxxx and contribute docs — every merged PR earns points, recognition, and lasting credit in the project.
🌟 Star TEN Framework on GitHub: https://github.com/TEN-framework/ten-framework

Zeabur Ship It Hackathon
$600 prize pool · Community badge
The Zeabur Ship It Hackathon is a 10-day global open-source challenge designed for builders who want to move fast.
Transform a raw idea into a fully deployed, production-ready application.
By using Zeabur AI Hub, an API for different AI models or using one-click deployment, you can take your project live on a zeabur.app domain in seconds.
To kickstart your journey, every participant using Zeabur AI Hub in their projects receives $5 credits.
🌟Star Zeabur on GitHub: https://github.com/zeabur/zeabur

We look forward to your participation.
The event organizers reserve the right to final interpretation.