DevFest Florida Hackathon (11/7/26 - 11/8/26)

about this event

Join GDG Central Florida for DevFest Hackathon, focused on leveraging AI Agents with cutting-edge Google technologies. DevFest Florida Hackathon: Build, Innovate & Connect. November 6, 2026 – Hackathon social – location and event details will be shared to registered guests. November 7–8, 2026 · UCF Downtown · Orlando, Florida.

Join the DevFest Florida Hackathon for a weekend where developers, designers, data practitioners, game creators, product thinkers, storytellers, and curious problem-solvers come together to imagine, build, and share. Bring an idea, bring a skill, or simply bring your curiosity. There is a place for you on this team. This is more than a competition. It is a community-powered opportunity to learn new tools, meet generous collaborators, and create technology that reflects human creativity, care, and purpose.

Find your people and build something meaningful. You do not need to arrive with a team or a fully formed idea. We will create time and space for you to meet collaborators, discover shared interests, and shape a project together. Throughout the weekend, you can: experiment with data science, game dev, communications tech, AI app development, Flutter, cloud technologies and WebXR; elevate your profile by building an impressive project using the Gemini AI suite, Vonage, Flutter, LangChain, Agent Development Kit and Google Cloud that makes your portfolio shine; learn how to use AI responsibly as a partner for human creativity and problem-solving; work across disciplines with people who bring different perspectives and strengths; get practical guidance from mentors and experienced engineering leaders; meet potential employers, future teammates, collaborators and co-founders; and turn an early idea into a prototype you can share with the community. Learn more at DevFestFlorida.com.

Your ticket supports the whole experience. We want you focused on learning, building and connecting. Your ticket includes: breakfast, lunches, dinner and snacks during scheduled event activities; hands-on workshops that support your professional growth and your hackathon project; access to mentors throughout the build; team-formation and project-planning support; a welcoming community of builders, creators and technology enthusiasts; opportunities to connect with employers and engineering leaders; and the chance to present your project, compete for prizes and celebrate together.

Learn from people who build in the real world. Saturday's workshops are designed to give you ideas, patterns and tools you can use right away. Dwane Hemmings, JavaScript Developer Advocate at Vonage, presents "WebXR: Augment Reality with Real-time Communications," a code-along workshop creating a WebXR application capable of receiving phone calls. Will Gorman, CTO of Nucleus Security, presents the Agentic Engineering Workshop, exploring how agent skills and agent orchestration are changing the software development life cycle. Carol Bolger, Founder and Flutter & AI Consultant, presents "Ask My Data: Building Grounded Gemini Agents with Flutter & Firebase," building a Flutter chat app that uses live Firestore data to ground Gemini responses. Javiera Laso, Lead Developer Consultant at Thoughtworks, presents "Build Your Own AI-Assisted Architecture Review Board," creating a practical blueprint for making architectural guidance more accessible, consistent and scalable while preserving human judgment.

Choose a track that feels like you. Bring your interests to one of three tracks. Each track welcomes different skills, and every strong team needs more than one kind of builder. Devs Track: build useful software with APIs, web or mobile applications, cloud infrastructure, machine learning, or other technologies that solve real-world problems. Game Devs Track: create playable prototypes and interactive media with gameplay programming, technical art, sound, animation and creative experimentation. Data for Good Track: use open data, analytics and clear visualizations to address community challenges such as civic accessibility, education and learning opportunities.

A weekend to learn, build and celebrate. Friday, November 6 — Come as you are: 6:30–8:30 PM, Hackathon social kickoff. Start the weekend by meeting the community, learning about the themes and tracks, and finding potential teammates. Come with a project idea or come ready to discover one with others. Location and social event details will be shared to registered guests. Saturday, November 7 — Learn, plan and build: the day begins with orientation and a keynote, followed by workshops in WebXR, agentic engineering, Flutter, AI, architecture and Gemini. After planning and team alignment, the hack begins at 2:30 PM. We will share dinner, keep building, and wrap up the first day at 8:00 PM. Sunday, November 8 — Share what you made: enjoy breakfast, continue building, and submit your project by 3:30 PM. Teams will present from 3:30–5:30 PM, followed by judge deliberations, awards and an after-party with the community. View the full schedule before you arrive so you can plan your weekend.

Build for your track—and compete for prizes. Each track will recognize three teams: 1st place team $500, 2nd place team $200, 3rd place team $100. Projects will be presented on Sunday before the judges deliberate and the awards are announced.

Everyone is invited. DevFest Florida is for developers, architects and cloud builders; Flutter, web, mobile, AI and data practitioners; game developers, artists, animators and sound designers; UX/UI designers and product thinkers; project managers, storytellers and community builders; and students, career changers and first-time hackers. You do not need a finished idea, a complete team, or a particular job title. Bring a laptop, a charger, an open mind, and a willingness to learn with others.

Join us at UCF Downtown on Nov 7th and 8th, 500 West Livingston Street, Orlando, FL 32801. DevFest Florida is made possible by the Central Florida technology community, including Google Developer Groups, Orlando Devs, and Indienomicon. Together, we are creating a weekend where learning becomes collaboration, collaboration becomes a prototype, and a prototype can become the beginning of something bigger.

Reserve your place. The best hackathon moments often begin with a simple conversation: a new teammate, a mentor's question, a workshop idea, or a prototype that takes an unexpected turn. Join us November 7–8, 2026 and help make something remarkable with your community. Learn more at DevFestFlorida.com.

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