Hackathon designs, 2026

Made in a day, not meant to be serious.

These come from three hackathons, each built in about a day. None of it was meant to be polished or serious. They are just the parts I liked most, running as they did.

What
Hackathon designs
When
October 2026
Time each
About a day
Role
Design and engineering

Fairseat, Blockchain at Berkeley

Pastel, minimal, and the logos.

Fairseat sells finals seats before anyone knows who plays. What I like on its events page is the team logos in their white circles, the way each card is put together, and how minimal it stays, with pastel colors throughout.

Winner, Ripple Track

4 events

  • Pro Football Championship

    Sun, Feb 14, 2027

    SoFi Stadium, Inglewood, CA

    From $5.52

  • World Series, Game 1

    Fri, Oct 23, 2026

    Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles, CA

    From $107.49

  • NBA Finals, Game 1

    Thu, Jun 3, 2027

    Chase Center, San Francisco, CA

    From $29.41

  • UEFA Super Cup 2027

    Wed, Aug 11, 2027

    Johan Cruyff ArenA, Amsterdam

    Yours if your team wins the Champions League

    From $7.92

The eventsPick a sport: the cards move to fit
The glow buttonLit from inside: brighter on hover, darker when pressed

Creator Ops, Zero Human Startup

The fill, the colors, the button.

Creator Ops runs a creator program with four AI agents. I can't quite explain it, but I like the budget bar: the fill, the colors and the composition. I also like the grid of reel previews with their stats, and the button, which is never flat.

The whole design system

The buttonA deeper base, a lit edge, a glow

Budget for October 2026

$4,000 of $12,000 paid or committed

Paid
$2,400
Payouts you approved
Committed
$1,600
Approved posts, payout not approved yet
Held
$900
What posts in review would earn
Remaining
$7,100
Left after all three
The budgetApprove, then pay out: the money moves along the bar
  • Rejected0:45Academic Comeback time #gauth #gauthpartner #examprep@moremonta· Apr 2918.2M3.3%20
  • In review1:14#gauth #gauthpartner #examprep #study #aitutor@unlocked_logic· May 15.9M0.8%42Low engagement
  • Approved0:22I Study smarter, not longer. @Gauth got me right.@kahlil.217· Feb 17702K6.9%55
The reelsReal posts from the recorded run, with their numbers

Blast, Supabase Select

Simple, with a color each.

Blast is a marketplace where AI agents hire specialist agents. I like its Hub: the specialists that tried out are ranked first, second and third, and the ones only listed sit on a slightly different color. It is really simple, a different color for each agent, with the company and the model along the bottom.

Best Use of StripeTeam of two, with Karim

61 specialists

Web design 5

1Ines@studionorth$0.90per job

Senior brand and web designer agent. Brand library of 12,000 palettes, licensed type, contrast and mobile checks.

Claude Sonnet 5.516 tryouts 9.9
2Tile@pixelmill$0.50per job

Fast landing pages from a template set.

GPT-5 mini16 tryouts 6.5
3Generalist@baselinenotools$0.00per job

A general model with no design tools: what your own agent would do alone. Here for comparison.

Claude Haiku 4.516 tryouts 3.7
Wireframe Wes@wesux$0.40per job

Low fidelity wireframes and a clickable prototype for any flow.

GPT-5 miniListed only
Palette@huehouse$0.60per job

Brand kits in minutes: palette, type pairing and a one page style guide.

Gemini 3.8 FlashListed only
The HubSwitch the kind of specialist

One day

A hackathon is one day, so I spend the craft on a few parts.

  1. Borrow the base.

    Take a component library and retune it to one color. Take the layouts from references. Fairseat started this way, so no hour went into a settings page.

  2. Pick the parts people will remember.

    A card, a bar, a button. Those get the colors and the details. Everything around them only has to be clean.

  3. Record a real run.

    A live demo can fail on stage. Creator Ops and Blast both demo by replaying a real recorded run, so nothing is faked and nothing breaks in front of the judges.