Meta’s artwork for the hackathon. Image: Meta
Meta is putting up a $1 million cash prize pool for developers who build apps on its newest AI models, in a 10-day online hackathon run by Meta Superintelligence Labs.
The Meta Global AI Developer Hackathon is free to enter and open worldwide, and every participant gets $150 of credits for the Meta Model API to build with. Meta hasn’t set the dates yet: the sign-up page says only that applications are “opening soon” and invites developers to register to be told when they do.
How to enter: sign up here with your name and email, and Meta will tell you when applications open.
What you can build with
Entrants can build on the Meta Model API, on Muse Code, Meta’s multi-agent coding tool, or on Meta’s open-weights models. There will be two tracks, one for indie developers and one for startup teams, and engineers and researchers from Meta Superintelligence Labs will run hands-on workshops across the ten days.
Meta announced the hackathon at its Connect conference last month, alongside a batch of developer news. Muse Spark 1.3, its latest model, is pitched at coding and agent work, Muse Code came out of beta, and the Meta Model API became generally available around the world. Muse Spark 1.3 is also available through Oracle’s cloud, and in private preview on Google Cloud.
The hackathon is meant “to help developers put these models to work right away”, Meta said.
What we don’t know yet
Meta hasn’t published the rules. There’s no word yet on how the $1 million will be split between the two tracks or between winners, how entries will be judged, who will judge them, or whether there are age or country limits beyond the promise that it is open worldwide. It also hasn’t said who will own what entrants build. Those details should appear when applications open.
Why it matters
Meta is a late entrant to the business of selling AI models to developers, a market led by OpenAI, Anthropic and Google, and it is spending to catch up. The hackathon follows its push to sell Muse to businesses and its free gadget kit for hobbyists. Prize money and free credits are a cheap way to get developers trying its models instead of the rivals they already use.
Sources: Meta, Global AI Developer Hackathon; Meta, “Meta Connect 2026: The end-to-end recap”.
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