GENIUS Olympiad 2026

About the challenge

GENIUS Coding Hackathon challenges GENIUS Olympiad Coding finalists to use programming, creativity, and problem-solving skills to develop a software-based solution for an assigned environmental issue. During this 24-hour in-person hackathon, students will work individually or in teams of up to two to design, build, test, and present a functional project.

Projects may include web applications, desktop software, data-driven tools, intelligent systems, AI-assisted applications, or other coding-based solutions. All work must be completed during the hackathon, and each team must demonstrate how their project meaningfully addresses the environmental challenge.

Get started

Students should bring their own laptop, charger, and any coding tools or development environments they plan to use. At the start of the hackathon, teams will receive the official environmental challenge prompt and may begin building their solution.

Teams may use programming languages, frameworks, open-source libraries, APIs, public datasets, internet resources, and AI-assisted tools. AI usage must be disclosed in the required AI usage declaration statement part of the submission form as well as the presentation. Teams must work independently and may not receive help or feedback from teachers, mentors, chaperones, other teams, or outside individuals during the hackathon.