AI hack days · Berkeley & the Bay Area
In a sunlit arena, two young builders face off. Each one calls up an AI sidekick: an orange block creature and a white ghost. The sidekicks fire beams that meet in a white flash. When the dust clears, both builders are still standing and grinning. The film ends on the Build SMTH logo and the line "Come and join build smth!" with the address buildsmth.org.
In May, 273 people signed up to spend a Saturday building at UC Berkeley, and 100+ showed up. Both of our 2026 hack days filled the room with 80 to 100 builders, about half students and half engineers and founders.
Counts from our Luma pages for May 9 and Oct 17.
There are no panels or slide decks. People form teams of one to four and get three hours to build with the newest AI tools. By five, the best teams demo live to judges from industry.
We plan the day around the people building: a clear brief, a three-hour build window, mentors in the room and one goal, a working project on stage.
Every event is about building with AI: agents, models, voice, video, infra and dev tools.
Top teams demo live and sponsors judge their own tracks. Judges have come from Google DeepMind, Google Labs, Amazon and YC-backed startups.
We run them with student groups, HKN in May and DiversaTech Consulting in October. AI and CS students from Berkeley and other Bay Area schools build next to engineers, designers and founders.
These days use the same build-and-demo format, for people who already ship for a living. About half of each room so far has come from industry, and we plan these days for them.
Each one filled the room with 80–100 builders and had sponsor tracks and live judging. We cut every clip below from photos of that day.
AI can write code, but it can't decide what's worth building. This one was about taste, creativity and judgment, the human side of building with AI.
We counted who signed up for our May 9 and Oct 17, 2026 hack days from our Luma guest lists.
565 builders signed up for our two hack days. They come from 19 universities and 41 companies and startups. Of those who share what they do, about 1 in 4 are founders or executives and about 1 in 5 are engineers.
Amazon · Apple · Google · Microsoft
Carnegie Mellon · Cornell · Duke · Minerva University · Northeastern · San José State · Stanford · UC Berkeley · UC Davis · UC San Diego · UC Santa Cruz · UCLA · University of Michigan
We list a company, lab or university when two or more guests name it in their Luma profile, public LinkedIn profile or email address. Names are in A to Z order.
Each bar is the share of guests who say what they do in their Luma profile or public LinkedIn headline. One person can be in two groups, for example a student who is also a founder.
Each bar is the share of people who answered "What are you excited to build?" when they signed up for May 9. One idea can fit two themes.
Counted 2026-11-03.
This is the real run of show from October 17. Sponsors demo their tools at kickoff, then judge their own track. Pick any step to jump to it.
These are candid photos from our 2026 campus hack days. Select a photo to see it larger.
In one afternoon, 80–100 builders try your product cold, build something with it and demo it on stage. We shape each partnership around what you want to learn.
Compute, inference, vector databases, deployment, observability.
Give every team credits and watch a full room deploy on your platform in one afternoon.
APIs and open weights for text, voice, video and multimodal.
Set a challenge around your model and see what builders make with it, live.
Agent platforms, coding tools, data APIs, deploy platforms.
Builders integrate your product with no hand-holding and tell you what's missing.
Investors and other partners are welcome too. Fountain Ventures sponsored our October event.
Teams build on your product with the credits, docs and tools you bring.
You demo live at kickoff, hold office hours during the build and judge your own track.
People who tried your product cold tell you what worked, what broke and what was missing.
Meet engineers, founders and students while they build. Past prizes included interviews.
You get repos, demo videos, photos and a recap to reuse in your own channels.
Pick the challenge, the judging criteria and the prize.
Bring credits, docs and a starter kit. We test it end to end before the day.
Demo at kickoff, hold office hours, then judge your track and hand out the prize.
We send you every project on your track, with photos and feedback.
| Partner | Track prize or contribution |
|---|---|
| MayKlarity Health | Cash prize and a chance to ship the solution to real providers |
| MayInsForge | InsForge credits for the top three teams |
| MayRetell AI | Cash prize and API credits |
| MayZeabur | Cash prize for the best deployment on Zeabur |
| MayEntelligence AI | An interview (hiring now) |
| MayPixVerse | Video creation API credits |
| OctGlasser | Credits for every builder and a best-use track |
| OctFountain Ventures | Event sponsor |
| OctEvent prizes | Incubation opportunities, interviews, coffee chats with founders and VCs |
Tell us about your product, what you'd love builders to make with it, and what you can bring. We'll shape a track around it.
Co-organizer, Build SMTH
Message Alex on LinkedIn (opens in a new tab)Co-organizer, Build SMTH
Message Aria on LinkedIn (opens in a new tab)A good first message covers your product, what builders should make with it, what you can bring and whether you want campus or off campus.