Open Atlas - AI for Social Good Hackathon 2026

Overview

The Open Atlas - AI for Social Good Hackathon 2026 invites developers to build AI products that address critical challenges faced by underserved populations. Unlike typical AI products, this hackathon focuses on creating solutions for immigrants navigating visa systems, families seeking affordable healthcare, students funding their education, and newcomers integrating into a new country. Participants will have two months to develop their solutions, gaining access to sponsor APIs, credits, and mentorship from engineers at leading AI labs. The event fosters a community known for producing successful founders, emphasizing hands-on problem-solving and shipping functional products. The strongest teams will be selected to pitch their projects live in Milpitas, California, on August 21, 2026, to a panel of judges from the Silicon Valley ecosystem. Following the pitches, a job fair will connect participants with sponsors and hiring teams, offering opportunities for networking, finding co-founders, or advancing their projects. The hackathon encourages participants to come prepared to build and launch impactful AI-driven solutions.

What to build

Participants are required to build an AI-powered solution that addresses a real social good problem. The theme is broad, with a focus on areas where AI can make a significant impact. Solutions should demonstrate substantive use of AI techniques such as LLMs, agents, RAG, vision, or speech, rather than just a single API call wrapped in a UI. Key areas of focus include: - Immigration and Mobility: Tools for navigating visa processes, credential recognition, settlement, and integration. - Education and Opportunity: Personalized learning, skills translation, accessibility tools, and mentorship matching. - Financial Inclusion: Credit access for newcomers, remittance optimization, fraud protection, and financial literacy. - Career and Talent: AI for workforce inclusion, resume translation, mock interviews, and networking for underrepresented talent. - Newcomer Settlement: Tools to assist newly arrived students and professionals with housing, logistics, and neighborhood matching. - Open Track: Any other AI solution that meaningfully advances social good.

Prizes

Key dates

• Submissions openJune 20, 2026
• Submission DeadlineAugust 20, 2026 @ 8:00pm EDT
• Live Pitch Event and Job FairAugust 21, 2026

Eligibility

Participants must be above the legal age of majority in their country of residence. Participation is restricted to residents of the US only.

How to enter

1. Register on Devpost (free, no fee) by clicking 'Register' at the top of the hackathon page.
2. Join the Open Atlas Slack via the invite link sent automatically after registration. This is where mentors, teammates, and sponsor API credits are found.
3. Find or form a team of 1 to 5 people. Solo participation is permitted. Use the #team-formation channel in Slack if seeking teammates.
4. Pick a problem from the 'What to Build' section or bring your own idea (open track).
5. Claim sponsor credits for OpenAI, Anthropic, cloud providers, and dev tools from the #sponsor-credits channel.
6. Start building your solution. Submissions open on June 20, 2026.
7. Submit your project through the Devpost page by August 20, 2026, 5:00 PM PT.

Submission requirements

• Project Name: Short, descriptive, memorable.
• Elevator Pitch: 2 to 3 sentences describing what the solution does and who it's for.
• Full Description: Detail the problem solved, target audience, how the solution works, models/APIs/frameworks used, what was built during the hackathon versus pre-existing components, complete tech stack, challenges encountered, and future plans for the project.
• Demo Video: 3 minutes or under, hosted on YouTube or Vimeo (public or unlisted), clearly showing the working product.
• Public Code Repository: GitHub or GitLab link with a clear README including setup and usage instructions. If private, ensure judges have access.
• Team Members: All team members tagged on the Devpost submission with their roles.
• Track Selection: Select the prize track(s) the project qualifies for (multiple selections allowed).
• Optional: Screenshots or GIFs of the product in action.
• Optional: A 3 to 5 slide pitch deck in PDF format.
• Optional: A live demo URL if the project is deployed.

Judging criteria

• Impact (25%)
• Creativity & Originality (25%)
• Technical Execution (25%)
• Feasibility (25%)

Sponsors & partners

Resources

• Full Rules
• Hackathon Manager Email