Festiverse 2026: Diwali Hackathon

about this event

Festiverse 2026 🪔✨ The World's Biggest Festival Hackathon -> More Details to follow as we come closer to the event. Code for culture. Build for the world. 🌍🪔 This Diwali, we are bringing you something special. From the festival of lights and joy, Festiverse is becoming a global gathering of builders, dreamers, creators, engineers, designers, founders, artists, and storytellers who want to imagine how the world will celebrate in the future.

Festiverse is a global hackathon where culture meets technology, tradition meets imagination, and celebration becomes something we can build together. This year's theme is: Festivals in the Age of AI 🪔🤖✨ How will people celebrate in the future? How will AI, apps, agents, voice, AR, payments, creator tools, social platforms, community technology, and immersive experiences transform the way we celebrate festivals, holidays, rituals, and cultural moments?

From Diwali to Christmas, Holi, Eid, Lunar New Year, Dashain, Thanksgiving, local street festivals, family gatherings, and new digital traditions, Festiverse invites participants to build products that make celebration more meaningful, accessible, creative, connected, and joyful. Whether you build an AI festival planner, a cultural storytelling app, a virtual celebration experience, a community coordination tool, a gifting marketplace, a creator platform, a festival commerce product, a safety tool, or something completely unexpected, Festiverse is your place to bring it to life. 🎆

Tracks 🏮 🪔 Culture and Community: Build tools that help people preserve traditions, connect with family, organize communities, or celebrate cultural identity. 🤖 AI and Celebration: Use AI to create new ways of planning, personalizing, storytelling, translating, recommending, or experiencing festivals. 🎨 Creator and Media: Build experiences for photos, videos, music, digital art, stories, live streams, avatars, performances, or festival content creation. 🎁 Commerce and Gifting: Build tools for festival shopping, gifting, local vendors, food ordering, creator marketplaces, ticketing, payments, or donations. 🌍 Access and Inclusion: Create products that make festivals easier to participate in for elders, immigrants, people with disabilities, remote families, multilingual communities, and first time attendees. 🎆 Open Innovation: Build anything bold, useful, beautiful, emotional, or unexpected that fits the theme of festivals and celebration. 🏆 Sponsor Tracks: Sponsor tracks will be announced soon.

Prizes 🏆✨ Prizes will be announced soon. Winners may be recognized across multiple categories, including: 🏆 Grand Prize 🤖 Best AI Project 🪔 Best Cultural Impact 🎨 Best Design 💻 Best Technical Execution 🌍 Best Community Project 🎁 Best Commerce or Gifting Project 🎆 Most Creative Festival Experience 🤝 Sponsor Track Winners

Main Stage 🏙️✨ San Francisco Festiverse will be hosted with San Francisco as the main stage, bringing together builders from one of the world's most creative technology ecosystems. Global hackathon hubs include: NY • Tokyo • Seoul • London • Mumbai More global participation details will be announced soon.

Eligibility 👥 Teams can have 1 to 4 people. Solo builders are welcome. Teams can be formed before the event or at the venue. All participants must apply and be approved before attending. Only approved attendees will be allowed to enter. Participants must bring a valid government issued ID. Only government ID will be accepted for check in.

Food, Drinks, and Experience 🍛🥤🎉 We will provide food, drinks, snacks, and essential hackathon support throughout the event. Expect a high energy and welcoming environment with building time, community moments, team formation, mentor support, demos, judging, celebration, and plenty of fun throughout the weekend.

Judging Criteria 🏆 Projects will be judged based on the following: ✨ Creativity and Originality 🪔 Cultural Relevance 🌍 Usefulness and Impact 💻 Technical Execution 🎨 Design and Experience 🤖 AI and Innovation 🎤 Presentation

FAQ 🪔 Q. Do I need a team before the event? 🎉 No. You can join as a solo participant, bring a team, or form a team at the venue. Q. What is the team size? 👥 Teams can have 1 to 4 people. Q. Can beginners join? ✨ Yes. Builders, designers, founders, students, artists, storytellers, and community organizers are welcome. Q. Do I need to know AI? 🤖 No. AI focused projects are encouraged, but you can also build tools, apps, experiences, designs, or products connected to the festival theme. Q. Can I work on an existing project? 🛠️ Projects should be built primarily during the hackathon. You may use existing libraries, APIs, tools, and starter code, but the submitted project should be created for Festiverse. Q. Will food and drinks be provided? 🍛🥤 Yes. Food, drinks, snacks, and basic hackathon essentials will be provided. Q. Do I have to wear traditional attire? 🥻🪔 No, but it is encouraged. Festiverse is about celebration, culture, and community, so festive or traditional clothing will make the experience more fun. Q. Do I need approval to attend? 🎟️ Yes. All participants must apply and be approved before attending. Q. What ID do I need? 🪪 You must bring a valid government issued ID. Only government ID will be accepted. Q. Can teams be formed at the venue? 🏮 Yes. There will be opportunities for solo participants to meet others and form teams at the venue. Q. Will there be sponsor tracks? 🏆 Yes. Sponsor tracks will be announced soon. Q. When will prizes be announced? 🎁 Prizes will be announced soon. Q. When will sponsors and partners be announced? 🤝 Sponsors, partners, and sponsor tracks will be displayed soon. Q. Can international participants attend? 🌍 Yes, approved international participants are welcome to attend. Q. Is visa support available? 🛂 If you need visa support or an invitation letter, please DM one of the hosts. We are open to helping with event related documentation where possible. Q. Will photos and videos be taken during the event? 📸🎥 Yes. Photos and videos will be taken throughout Festiverse for event memories, social media, recap content, sponsor updates, and future promotions. Q. What should I expect from the event experience? 🪔🎉 Expect a fun, welcoming, high energy environment with food, drinks, building time, team formation, cultural celebration, mentorship, demos, judging, and lots of opportunities to meet amazing people. Q. Will there be power available? 🔌 Yes. Power will be available, and multiple power strips will be available throughout the venue. Q. Will overnight stay be allowed? 🌙 Overnight stay details are still being decided. More information will be announced soon. Q. Where do we submit projects? 📂 The submission platform will be announced soon. Q. Will there be a Discord or Slack? 📱 Discord, Slack, or community link coming soon. Q. Are partnerships open? 🎆 Yes. Festiverse is open to partners and sponsors. Please contact the organizing team for partnership and sponsorship opportunities. Q. What should I build? 💡 Build something that explores the future of festivals, culture, celebration, community, and AI. The best ideas will feel useful, creative, culturally thoughtful, and exciting.

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