TIMELINE
2 Weeks in 2024
ROLE
Lead Designer
PURPOSE
Personal Project
SUMMARY
Platform for Hackathons
Hackathons are fertile ground for creativity, learning, and launching new ideas. But for many developers, the friction begins long before writing a single line of code.
They struggle to discover events that match their interests or timeline.
They lack an easy way to find teammates with complementary skills.
Communication is fragmented across Discord, Google Docs, and endless DMs.
Projects often vanish post-event without a place to share, showcase, or iterate.
Despite an explosion of virtual and hybrid hackathons post-2020, tooling for participants remains disjointed. We saw an opportunity to reimagine the hackathon experience end-to-end—not just during the event, but before and after too.
INTRODUCTION
End Goal
We scoped this platform with one North Star: Accelerate innovation by reducing collaboration friction in hackathons.
This translated into four core goals:
Discovery: Make finding relevant hackathons effortless.
Teaming: Help devs find and vet potential collaborators.
Workflow: Enable real-time idea sharing and coordination.
Showcasing: Offer a space to publish and promote projects post-event.
RESEARCH
User Interviews
We conducted interviews with 12 developers across varying levels of experience, including:
Solo participants who often join last-minute
First-timers who felt overwhelmed by logistics
Power users who participate in >5 hackathons/year
RESEARCH
Process & Painpoints
What do users do today and where do they encounter friction points in the journey?
How does a user feel at each stage and what are the pain points?
ANALYZE
Key Takeaways & Features
What do we need to solve the key issues of the user?
PROTOTYPES
Design Mockups
How to figure out MVP vs Future stages