🔍 Key Information

The final stretch of the hackathon involves submitting your project and presenting it to the judges. Here's everything you need to know to ensure a smooth process and give your project the best chance at success.

📅 Submission Deadline: All projects must be submitted by Invalid date. Late submissions won't be accepted, so be sure to plan ahead!

🔗 How to Submit: Head over to your Hacker Dashboard to submit your project. You'll fill out the form with essential details like your project title, description, and a link to your repository.

🎥 Demo Video: While optional, we strongly encourage you to include a 2-4 minute demo video showcasing your project. This video will be featured on the ETHGlobal Showcase, so take your time making it clear and informative.

💰 Partner Prizes: On the last step of the submission form, you can select up to 3 Partner Prizes to apply for. If a partner has multiple tracks, you can be eligible for all of them while only counting as 1 Partner Prize. Please ensure to select these prizes carefully as it is the only way for partners to assess your project.

🚨 Important Rules

Start Fresh: All work on your project must begin after the hackathon officially starts. Any prior code, designs, or assets are not allowed unless they're from public libraries or starter kits. Projects built before the event may still participate but won't qualify for partner prizes or the Finalist category.

Version Control: Use version control to track your code during the event. Submissions with large single commits or missing histories may be disqualified, as it's important to show your progress throughout the hackathon.

Open Source Libraries & Boilerplates: You're welcome to use open-source libraries and starter kits to kickstart your project, but be transparent.

Include Everything: Your submission should include a GitHub Repo, Figma files, or equivalent, proving the work was done during the hackathon. Clearly distinguish between what's new and what's reused.

🤖 Use of AI Tools

The use of AI tools (e.g., ChatGPT, Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, Cursor, etc.) is generally permitted, but with the following guidelines to ensure transparency and integrity:

Attribution: Clearly document in your submission where and how AI tools were used in the project. This includes specifying which parts of the code, specific files, or assets were generated or assisted by AI.

Involvement: AI tools should be used to assist your development process, not to create the entire project. Submissions that rely entirely on AI without meaningful contributions from team members may not be eligible for partner prizes or finalist consideration.

🚀 Submitting Your Project

When you're ready to submit, you have two options:

1. Finalist and Partner Prizes

Opting for this will require you to present your project to judges in the Finalist judging session. You'll also present to partners for any prizes you applied for at their booths.

2. Partner Prizes Only

If you're not aiming for the Finalist category, you can select up to 3 Partner Prizes during submission. For each partner prize, you'll need to explain how you've used or integrated their tools, provide feedback, and share relevant comments. You are free to demo your project to the partners at their booths and collect feedback and connect.

🏅 Attending Judging Sessions

Once you've submitted your project, information about your Finalist judging session will appear on your Hacker Dashboard. Here's what to expect:

• Head to the judging check-in table, where you'll be prepared for your session.
• Each team has 7 minutes to present: 4 minutes for the demo, followed by 3 minutes for Q&A with the judges.

Common Questions to Prepare For:

• What inspired your project?
• What tools did you use, and why?
• What challenges did you solve, and how?

⚖️ Judging Criteria

Judges will evaluate your project based on five categories:

1. Technicality: How complex is the problem you're addressing, and how sophisticated is your solution?
2. Originality: Is your project introducing a new idea or creatively solving an existing problem?
3. Practicality: How complete and functional is your project? Could it be used by its target audience today?
4. Usability (UI/UX/DX): How intuitive is your project? Have you made it easy for users to interact with your solution?
5. WOW Factor: Does your project leave a lasting impression? This is the catch-all for anything unique or impressive that may not fit into the other categories.

🤝 Partner Judging

Once your project is submitted, you're set. The following part is entirely optional. Present live to partners for the prizes you applied for. Here's how it works:

Go to each partner booth for every prize you've applied to.

• Present your project live to the partner reps.
• Partners will judge your project based on the same criteria mentioned above. Partner prize winners will be announced during the closing ceremony.

🎬 Tips for a Great Demo Video

Your demo video, while optional, is a key part of showcasing your project. Make sure it meets the following guidelines:

• Keep it between 2 and 4 minutes: A shorter, clear demo is better than a long, unfocused one.
• Don't rush: Speak clearly and at a pace that's easy to follow.
• Avoid background noise and echo: A good microphone or choosing a room with better acoustics will make a big difference.
• Keep introductions short: You don't need to spend more than 20 seconds on your backstory.
• Show your project in action and skip any unnecessary waiting (like MetaMask confirmations).
• Use slides to summarize key points: no more than 4 bullet points per slide.

Common mistakes to avoid in your demo video

We see a lot of these mistakes during submissions, which require a team to re-submit their video in order to qualify for judging. Please be mindful of these common issues if you'd like to be considered for prizes. If we see one or more of these items on your submission, you will be asked to re-submit the video.

1. 🚨 DO NOT export the video in any resolution less than 720p
2. 🚨 DO NOT exceed the 4-minute submission length
3. 🚨 DO NOT speed up the video to fit under the time limit
4. 🚨 DO NOT play music with text on the video describing your project (instead of talking)
5. 🚨 DO NOT use mobile phones to record the video submission
6. 🚨 DO NOT use a text to speech synthesizer

💡 Need Inspiration?

• Iris - Iris, messenger of the gods. Twitter x Patreon x Twitch x TikTok, built on Lens

• Splits - Automatically route funds from one address to set of addresses

• Ollie Verse - NFT Trading Card Game that allows player to create and mint their own trading cards

• Cadbury - Open, neutral, border-less, decentralized, and censorship resistance meetings

• Umbra - Umbra is protocol for enabling stealth payments on the Ethereum blockchain

• Sunset Supreme - A Google sheets plugin for MultiBaas (a REST API for Ethereum) to allow display, interaction, and analysis of data on the blockchain

• DeFi777 - Use DeFi protocols from any wallet! Wrapper tokens let you use Uniswap, Aave, Balancer & Set in normal wallets without a dapp browser

• Oya Market - Oya is a decentralized ecommerce protocol owned by its users and run by smart contracts