Step 01Sat Jun 6
Find your person
Community Center · 9 AM – 2 PM
Pick who you're building for. Already have someone? Call or text them to interview. Building for a persona? Sketch out their life and frustrations.
Lexington · Massachusetts◦Coords 42.447° N, 71.224° W
Build
for someone.
LexHack ’26 is Lexington’s first hackathon. Pick a real person or imagine one. Understand their problem. Spend a week building something just for them.
Jun 6 + 13
Two Saturdays
30–40
Students
1 wk
Build window
Free
No cost
— The premise
Every project starts with a person.
Every team picks one real person — someone they know, or a realistic persona — and builds a tool for their specific problem. The project has a real user before a single line of code is written.
Path A
Build for someone you know
Pick a real person in your life (a parent, teacher, coach, neighbor) and build for their exact problem. They don’t have to come to the event, but they’re welcome to show up on Demo Day to see what you built.
Path B
Build for a persona
Don’t have a specific person? That’s fine. Define a realistic persona — “a college student who can never find study rooms” or “an elderly person who struggles with grocery apps.” Ground it in reality. The more specific the person feels, the better the project.
“
Both paths are equally valid. Judges care about whether you deeply understood a human problem and built a thoughtful solution.
— The arc
How it works.
Two Saturdays. One week. One person’s problem, solved.
Step 02Jun 7 – 12
Build the solution
From Home · Discord
You have a full week. Work from home, coordinate on Discord, share prototypes with your person (or test with people who fit your persona). Helpers are available all week.
Step 03Sat Jun 13
Demo Day
Community Center · 9 AM – 2 PM
Present your project. Explain who your person is. Show the working product. If your person came — they join you on stage. If not — share their reaction. Then judges and participants vote.
— The itinerary
Schedule.
Two Saturdays in person, one week building remotely.
9:00 AM
Organizers arrive, setup
9:30 AM
Doors open, check-in, name tags, swag, snacks
10:00 AM
Opening Ceremony
10:30 AM
Team formation + person selection
11:15 AM
Lunch
11:45 AM
Each team presents their person's problem (1 min each)
12:00 PM
Planning session: sketch solution, choose tech stack
12:30 PM
Workshop: Getting Started (Git, APIs, deployment)
1:15 PM
Hacking begins
1:45 PM
Snacks and wrap-up
2:00 PM
Day 1 ends, continue building from home
— The recognition
Prizes.
Recognition for outstanding work across five categories.
MagnitudeM 0.0
Grand Prize
Best combination of real-world impact and technical execution.
Grand Prize TBA
MagnitudeM 1.2
Most Creative Solution
Unexpected approach to the problem.
MagnitudeM 1.4
Best First-Time Hacker
Remarkable first hackathon, first project, first step.
MagnitudeM 1.6
Best Presentation
The demo that had the whole room engaged.
MagnitudeM 1.8
People's Choice
Voted by all participants.
Prize pool is sponsor-funded. Want to contribute? Email us
— The measure
Judging.
Format
Every team presents for 7 minutes: 5-minute demo + 2-minute Q&A from judges.
Scoring
Final scores: 60% from 4 judges + 40% participant vote. You can’t vote for yourself.
Criteria
Impact / Usefulness30%
Technical Execution25%
Creativity20%
Design / UX15%
Presentation10%
— Questions
Ask anything.
Still have questions? Email us or join our Discord
— The supporters
Our partners.
LexHack is made possible by the support of our sponsors and partners.
Title Sponsor
Your logo here
Gold Sponsors
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Silver Sponsors
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Community Partners
Sponsor inquiries
Help Lexington’s first hackathon happen.
Email lexhackclub@gmail.comAll contributions are tax-deductible through The Hack Foundation, 501(c)(3) · EIN 81-2908499