About the challenge
hackPHS hosts over 300 high school students from across New Jersey to collaborate, innovate, and create in a 24-hour, in-person student organized hackathon based at Princeton High School. Whether you're a complete beginner or an experienced hacker, hackPHS will have something for you! hackPHS's goal is to provide a space for young and eager minds to collaborate with others, form new bonds, and create meaningful projects.
Get started
Please make sure you have filled out our Google Form, and reviewed the submission requirements and rules!
Requirements
What to Build
hackPHS is a completely open-ended hackathon -- we don't restrict you at all in what you can build :).
That being said, we do provide a theme as a starting point. Projects that connect to the theme especially well, or that do it in a creative way will be given more consideration in judging. Our theme for hackPHS 2026 is "Into the Skies".
What to Submit
An open-source respository along with some description of the project
Prizes
First Place
1x Gaming monitor for each team member. 24-inch Full HD / 200Hz / 0.3ms
3 months of ElevenLabs Pro per member,
1 year of NordVPN Prime, NordPass Premium, NordProtect/Coveron, and Incogni,
1 GB of Saily eSIM data,
3 months of nexos.ai access and €200 in credits,
Four $25 AoPS coupons for the team,
30% off the Algoverse program for the first-place team,
$1,000 scholarship toward the RISE Research Program,
2 years of Windscribe Pro,
4 years of TI-84 Plus CE Online Calculator access,
and 3 months of Codeset Fellow for each winning member.
Second Place
1x Gaming keyboard for each team member. Magnetic switches, rapid trigger, 8,000Hz polling, and customizable RGB.
$1,000 scholarship toward the RISE Research Program,
2 years of Windscribe Pro,
4 years of TI-84 Plus CE Online Calculator access, and
3 months of Codeset Fellow.
Third Place
1x Gaming mouse for each team member. VXE Dragon Fly R1. 55g, adjustable sensitivity and buttons. Bluetooth, 2.4GHz wireless, or USB.
$1,000 scholarship toward the RISE Research Program,
2 years of Windscribe Pro,
4 years of TI-84 Plus CE Online Calculator access, and
3 months of Codeset Fellow.
[MLH] Best Use of ElevenLabs
Wireless Earbuds
Deploy natural, human-sounding audio with ElevenLabs. Create realistic, dynamic, and emotionally expressive voices for any project, from interactive AI companions to narrated stories and voice-enabled apps. ElevenLabs will empower you to build rich, immersive experiences without the need for actors or complex audio production, using simply the power of AI.
Integrate fully autonomous audio experiences into your hack with ElevenLabs and give your project a voice, along with giving your team the chance to win some wireless earbuds!
[MLH] Best Use of Solana
Assorted Prizes
The world of development is evolving fast and Solana is leading the charge with a network built to handle all of your infrastructure needs. Forget high fees and slow confirmations, it’s time to build applications that are fast, efficient, and scalable.
Harness Solana’s core advantages like blazing fast execution and near-zero transaction costs to make your hackathon ideas become real world projects. With Solana, the possibilities are endless.
Create a game, social app, or consumer product that relies on instant, high-frequency transactions.
Design a sophisticated trading, lending, or decentralized exchange (DEX).
Build a prototype for supply chain, identity, or payments that can handle massive, real-world volume.
Show us how you can innovate with Solana for a chance to win some cool prizes for you and each member of your team!
[MLH] Best Use of Tiger Data
Stream Deck Mini
Building high-performance apps under hackathon deadlines shouldn't mean spending half your weekend configuring complex databases or learning obscure query languages. Tiger Data extends PostgreSQL to give student developers an ultra-fast foundation for real-time data, time-series metrics, and complex analytics.
Why build with Tiger Data this weekend?
Standard SQL Power: Query massive datasets instantly using the SQL you already know, with no complex NoSQL aggregation pipelines required.
Unified Data Stack: Store relational user profiles and high-frequency metric streams side-by-side in a single database.
Instant Dashboards: Serve lag-free, real-time frontend charts using pre-computed Continuous Aggregates.
90%+ Data Compression: Store millions of events on free-tier cloud instances without running out of disk space.
Whether you’re building real-time IoT monitoring, AI-driven analytics dashboards, or financial prediction engines, show us how Tiger Data powers your project. The team that demonstrates the most innovative, impactful, and performance-driven use of Tiger Data will take home some great prizes!
[MLH] Best Use of GenAI
Assorted Prizes
Generative AI is rapidly changing the landscape of software development. This category challenges you to build novel applications that leverage the power of Generative AI APIs. Think outside the box and integrate cutting-edge AI models to create innovative solutions with real-world impact.
To participate, utilize publicly available Generative AI APIs (like those from OpenAI, Anthropic, Hugging Face, Llama, IBM Watson, or Google Gemini) to develop a unique and functional application. This could include:
AI-powered creative tools: Design an app that allows users to generate unique marketing copy, translate languages in real-time, or create personalized learning experiences.
Intelligent assistants and automation: Build a chatbot that can provide insightful customer support, or a system that automates complex tasks using natural language processing.
Next-generation content creation platforms: Develop a platform that empowers users to generate high-quality images, write different kinds of creative text formats, or compose original music with AI assistance.
This is your chance to get hands on with cutting edge tech, put your skills on display, and of course, win some awesome prizes!
[MLH] Best Use of DigitalOcean
Retro Wireless Mouse
DigitalOcean offers a reliable and easy-to-use cloud platform for every stage of your project. Leverage core services like Droplets, Managed Databases, and App Platform to build, deploy, and scale your application effortlessly. Building with AI? DigitalOcean Gradient™ AI enables you to build, train, and deploy machine learning models, including access to GPU infrastructure and serverless inference!
Sign up for DigitalOcean today and reach out to your MLH Coach for credits that you can use towards building your next great hack. Build with DigitalOcean’s robust cloud infrastructure for a chance to win some great prizes for you and each of your teammates!
[MLH] Best Use of MongoDB Atlas
M5Stack IoT Kit
MongoDB Atlas takes the leading modern database and makes it accessible in the cloud! Get started with a $50 credit for students or sign up for the Atlas free forever tier (no credit card required). Along with a suite of services and functionalities, you’ll have everything you need to manage all of your data, and you can get a headstart with free resources from MongoDB University! Build a hack using MongoDB Atlas for a chance to win a M5Stack IoT Kit for you and each member of your group.
Best Use of Elevenlabs
3 months of Scale: $897 value over 3 months · 1.8 million credits/month.
2 Cow Squishmallows & 2 Stuffed Cow Plushies. Each track-winning team also receives these four plush prizes, in addition to its track award above.
Best Cybersecurity Hack
3 years of Windscribe.
2 Cow Squishmallows & 2 Stuffed Cow Plushies. Each track-winning team also receives these four plush prizes, in addition to its track award above.
Best Project Related to Codeset
Fellow tier: Valued at $1,200 per year.
2 Cow Squishmallows & 2 Stuffed Cow Plushies. Each track-winning team also receives these four plush prizes, in addition to its track award above.
Devpost Achievements
Submitting to this hackathon could earn you:
Judges
Alex Sheng
Princeton High School
Oscar Huang
Princeton High School
Daniel Haiduc
Princeton University
Alexi Meyers
Princeton University
Nicholas Kopiliani
Princeton University
Edward Yin
Om Mehta
Georgia Tech
Shaurya Ranjan
Princeton High School
Judging Criteria
-
Innovativeness
How innovative is this submission? Does the implementation of this idea break convention? -
Functionality
Is the project in a usable state? Is using it intuitive enough for the average user to understand? Does it fulfill the concept? -
Creativity
Did you clearly think outside of the box when making this? Is it just a React To-do app or something more? -
Theme
How much did this project align with the theme of "Into the Skies"? -
Technical
Note that we will also be allowing yet regulating AI.
Questions? Email the hackathon manager
Tell your friends
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.












