about this event
🚀 Make an impact on real world problems in a single weekend! 🚀 HSI is back for our third year in a row! Join Hack for Social Impact once again to tackle real-world challenges. We are teaming up with non-profit partners to present you with important and well-scoped challenges, in partnership with the UN Convention to Combat Desertification and 4 local nonprofits. This event is supported by our sponsors: Gemini, Bild.ai, and Wefunder. Developers will receive credits during the hackathon to work on your projects from our sponsors and technology partners. $5000 cash prizes in total for the winners of projects.
This year, we've teamed up with incredible partners to tackle pressing issues in mental health, climate, justice reform, and art & design:
🌎 Climate: Work with the UN to build an interactive game to enable the community to participate in land planning! Block by Block is a Minecraft-based tool for communities to design their own streets, and has run in 55 countries since 2012. However, it is unsuited to UNCCD's work in real-world land planning: Minecraft has endless resources, arbitrary terrain, and no consequence to player actions. Build a game from real satellite and GIS data showing the impact of land use, to engage the community.
🩷 Mental Health: Boundless Freedom Project can reach people inside with mindfulness and mental health practice through in-person sessions and the Edovo tablets. On release that support falls away, during the 30 days that hit hardest. Build something that keeps familiar practice at hand, holds as little personal information as possible, and assumes no smartphone and no dependable internet.
⚖️ Justice Reform: California's corrections department spends under one percent of its budget on rehabilitation. Transformative Programming Works advocates for them across 120 organizations, but so far can only track process data such as who enrolled and how long a class ran. Join disjoint records such as parole and recidivism data into a framework TPW, and nonprofits generally, can use to track impact.
🎨 Art & Design: BRIDGEGOOD's Oakland studio teaches designers to build with their own communities in mind, through conversations about identity, money and conflict that only work in a small room with a facilitator in it. That room seats a few dozen people a year. Find a way the practice can travel to designers who will never sit in it, without thinning into a slide deck.
🏆 Past winners went to present at UN Climate Conference and build startups that get accepted to YC and raise seed funding! 🎯 Will your weekend hack be next year's success story?
✨ Register your interest and follow us on our LinkedIn for more Partner & Prize announcements ✨ For more information on the event and a recap of last year, visit our website! Still have questions?
🤝 Who should sign up? Anyone with a passion to build. Whether you are a technical engineer or a non-technical innovator, if you want to team up with smart, driven people to create positive change, you belong here. Bring your unique skills and the energy to make the world a better place to spend the weekend solving real problems together. Interested in joining the HSI team? Contact us! Interested in becoming a sponsor? Contact us! Interested in working with our partners? Join the list!
tracks
Climate
Work with the UN to build an interactive game to enable the community to participate in land planning. Block by Block is a Minecraft-based tool for communities to design their own streets, and has run in 55 countries since 2012, but it is unsuited to UNCCD's work in real-world land planning. Build a game from real satellite and GIS data showing the impact of land use, to engage the community.
Mental Health
Boundless Freedom Project can reach people inside with mindfulness and mental health practice through in-person sessions and the Edovo tablets. On release that support falls away, during the 30 days that hit hardest. Build something that keeps familiar practice at hand, holds as little personal information as possible, and assumes no smartphone and no dependable internet.
Justice Reform
California's corrections department spends under one percent of its budget on rehabilitation. Transformative Programming Works advocates for them across 120 organizations, but so far can only track process data such as who enrolled and how long a class ran. Join disjoint records such as parole and recidivism data into a framework TPW, and nonprofits generally, can use to track impact.
Art & Design
BRIDGEGOOD's Oakland studio teaches designers to build with their own communities in mind, through conversations about identity, money and conflict that only work in a small room with a facilitator in it. That room seats a few dozen people a year. Find a way the practice can travel to designers who will never sit in it, without thinning into a slide deck.
when
Hack for Social Impact 2026 - Day 1
First day of the weekend hackathon; teams tackle challenges with non-profit partners.
◍ 1885 Mission StHack for Social Impact 2026 - Day 2
Final day of the hackathon, wrapping up projects and awarding $5,000 in total cash prizes to winners.
◍ 1885 Mission Sttickets
| tickets | price | Fee | Status | description |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free Registration | Free | — | Available | Free registration to participate in Hack for Social Impact 2026. Register your interest to take part. |
prizes
| # | PRIZE | price |
|---|---|---|
| Winner | Cash prizes in total for the winners of projects | $5,000 |