Hackathons in Chicago

What's on this weekend, two and a half hours up the tracks from Champaign. Refreshed every Monday morning.

Updated Mon Oct 26, 9:20 PM CT

This weekend · Oct 30 – Nov 1

In person, Chicago & Evanston. Amtrak from Champaign → Union Station.

Nothing found in Chicago this weekend. Check “Coming up” below.

Coming up in Chicago

Next ~6 weeks — register early.

Fri Nov 13–15

CIQ Supercomputing Local AI Hackathon (pre-SC26)

Fulton Market District (exact address shown after registration), Chicago

Weekend AI/HPC hackathon hosted by CIQ, NVIDIA, VAST Data and Lenovo. Each of 20 teams of 3-5 gets two Lenovo ThinkStation PGX (GB10 Grace Blackwell) machines on a multi-node cluster. Tracks: multi-node training, inference at scale, scientific AI, and cluster/scheduling. Top 3 teams win SC26 passes and a PGX. Registration needs host approval and asks for HPC/multi-node experience.

🚆 Fulton Market is about a 20-25 min walk northwest of Union Station, or take the Green/Pink Line to Morgan.

Free18+, host approval requiredaggregator only — confirm date

Sat Nov 21 · 3:00 PM - 9:00 PM CST

Build the Table: Friendsgiving 2026 Hospitality Buildathon

Chicago

Half-day buildathon on hospitality tech, followed by a Friendsgiving social. Open to all levels, no coding required. Lighter than a full hackathon but it is a real build event.

Free21+aggregator only — confirm date

Midwest college hackathons

Bigger weekend hackathons outside Chicago.

Sat Nov 7–8 · 24 hours

MakeUC 2026

University of Cincinnati (1819 Innovation Hub per Devpost listing), Cincinnati, OH

24-hour IEEE-hosted MLH hackathon at the University of Cincinnati, open to beginners and experienced hackers.

Students

Sat Nov 14–15

Hack The Nest

Eastern Michigan University, Ypsilanti, MI

MLH hackathon at EMU with a hardware focus. Meals, workspace and swag are covered.

FreeCollege and high school students

Sat Nov 14–15

Central Hacks

Central Michigan University, Pearce Hall, Mount Pleasant, MI

College hackathon at CMU, run by Women in Technology. The official Devpost page blocked fetching, so these dates come from aggregators.

Studentsaggregator only — confirm date

Sat Feb 6–7 · 24 hours

SpartaHack 12

MSU STEM Teaching and Learning Facility, 642 Red Cedar Rd, East Lansing, MI

Michigan State's 24-hour MLH hackathon with lodging in the building and possible travel support. Early applications opened Oct 25. The early deadline is Nov 29, 2026, 11:59 PM ET.

FreeStudents, all majors and levels

Sat Feb 6–7 · 24 hours

InnovateHer

Wilmeth Active Learning Center, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN

24-hour MLH hackathon at Purdue focused on diversity. Its date clashes with SpartaHack.

FreeCurrent college students or graduates from the past 12 months

Fri Feb 26–28

HackIllinois 2027

University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL

UIUC's flagship hackathon with about 1,000 students, on campus. The official site only has an interest form so far; the dates come from the MLH 2027 schedule.

FreeStudentsaggregator only — confirm date