Dates
Building Begins: 8 PM on Friday, February 28, 2026
Hard Deadline for Devpost Submission: 10 PM on Saturday, February 28, 2026
Hard Deadline for Project Coding/Assembling: 8 AM on Sunday, March 1, 2026
Judging Period: 10 AM - 2 PM on Sunday, March 1
Closing Ceremony: 3 PM on Sunday, March 1
Eligibility
To apply as a hacker, you must be a university/college student. Once accepted, you must abide by these rules to remain eligible as a hacker:
- Team Size Limit: Participation is capped at teams of up to 4 members. This ensures a level playing field and encourages effective collaboration.
- Hacker's Status: All team members must have the "attended" status on the hackathon website, indicating they were accepted into the hackathon and have checked in properly in person. This is essential to verify eligibility for participation and judging.
- Any code and design assets used in your project must be written between 8:00 PM EST on Friday, February 27, 2026, and 8:00 AM EST on Sunday, March 1, 2026.
- Your team's project must be submitted to DevPost by Saturday at 10:00 PM EST to be eligible for judging.
- It is permitted and recommended to install any necessary software in advance.
- It is permitted to plan your project out in advance.
- It is permitted to 3D-print parts or prepare other structural components for hardware projects in advance. However, assembly of hardware projects in advance is not permitted. Hardware will not necessarily be provided for use.
- Plagiarism is not tolerated, and any teams with plagiarized work will be disqualified.
- Reusing code from any company or professional organization is not permitted.
- You may use any publicly available libraries/packages/design assets.
Code with integrity! Final interpretation of all the rules included in this document is at the sole discretion of DeerHacks organizers, and any potential violations will be dealt with privately between the team and organizers.
Project and Submission Requirements
Your team must submit your project to Devpost by Saturday at 10:00 PM to be eligible for judging.
Submit a video in your Devpost project submission if you can't demo live, given a valid reason. A video must be between 2-4 minutes long.
An in-person demo will be 4 minutes long in total: a 3-minute demo and 1 minute for questions from the judges.
Prizes
Non-cash prizes - information released during the opening ceremony!