Status · Closed Event timeline ·View schedule →

Hackathon control board Istanbul 2025, scaling edition

Bitcoin++ Scaling Edition

Build something real. Find collaborators, choose a challenge, ship your project, and put it in front of the bitcoin++ community.

Submissions closed How to participate ↓

§ Start here

Three steps from idea to demo.

Everything you need to enter, build, and submit without hunting through the conference site.

01
Join a team
Bring collaborators or add teammates from their bitcoin++ profiles. One person belongs to one project team.
02
Choose your build
Enter the open competition, then opt into any sponsor challenges your project qualifies for.
03
Submit your Project
Add your pitch, team, repository, demo, and supporting links before submissions close.

Team sizeUnlimited

What countsAnything Bitcoin

Challenge entryOptional + stackable

Submissions closed

§ The brief

Welcome to the Bitcoin++ Scaling Edition Hackathon!

This is the hackathon site for the bitcoin++ scaling edition hackathon in Istanbul, Turkiye.

The main hackathon competition will be open ended (overall 1st, 2nd, 3rd). Anything involving bitcoin is fair game. Bonus points for scaling related projects.

There are optional challenges that hackers may create projects around. Submitting for a challenge is optional, and ALL projects will be considered for the main competition.

Logistics

Thursday (9/4/25)
Kickoff Presentation: 12:30 PM (GMT+03:00)
Hacking Begins: 1:30 PM
Submission Deadline: 4:30 PM - On Devpost

Report for Judging Expo: 5:30 PM
Judging Expo: 5:45 PM - 7:45 PM - MAX 3 minutes (practice & time yourself)

Friday (9/5/25)
Finalist Presentations: 5:00 PM - 5:45 PM - 5 minutes per team (main stage)
Awards & Closing: 6:30 PM

§ Prizes

Prize pool.

Ranked rewards for the top projects. Challenges can stack on top.

★ 1st place · grand prize

2.5M satoshis

Artmak

1st Overall · 2.5M satoshis

★ 2nd place

1.5M satoshis

Core LLM + 2nd Overall — future Bitcoin++ ticket

2nd Overall · 1.5M satoshis

★ 3rd place

1M satoshis

zkpoor + 3rd Overall — future Bitcoin++ ticket

3rd Overall · 1M satoshis

+ Additional awards

[ Award ]

Best use of STARKs

2 Million Satoshis - Build projects that leverage STARKs (Scalable Transparent Arguments of Knowledge) for Bitcoin or its ecosystem (Lightning, Nostr, Cashu, Ark, Liquid, etc.).

Prizes

Best use of STARKs prize 2M satoshis

2 Million Satoshis - Build projects that leverage STARKs (Scalable Transparent Arguments of Knowledge) for Bitcoin or its ecosystem (Lightning, Nostr, Cashu, Ark, Liquid, etc.).

[ Award ]

Best Beginner Hack

Tickets to future Bitcoin++ event - Only eligible to teams where EVERY member is a high-school/undergraduate student OR a first-time contributor to open-source bitcoin.

Prizes

Best Beginner Hack — future Bitcoin++ ticket 1 satoshis

One ticket to a future Bitcoin++ event for each winning team member.

[ Award ]

Best Privacy Hack

Tickets to future Bitcoin++ event - For the project that best protects privacy, evades censorship, or empowers free expression in hostile environments.

Prizes

Best Privacy Hack — future Bitcoin++ ticket 1 satoshis

One ticket to a future Bitcoin++ event for each winning team member.

[ Award ]

Honorable Mentions

Tickets to future Bitcoin++ event - Awarded to up to 6 “honorable mentions”

Prizes

Honorable Mentions — future Bitcoin++ ticket 1 satoshis

One ticket to a future Bitcoin++ event for each winning team member.

[ Award ]

Moon Math Award

Tickets to future Bitcoin++ event - For the team with the boldest or most novel exploration into cryptography.

Prizes

Moon Math Award — future Bitcoin++ ticket 1 satoshis

One ticket to a future Bitcoin++ event for each winning team member.

[ Award ]

Reality Check Award

Tickets to future Bitcoin++ event - For the team whose project could realistically launch and attract users on mainnnet soon™.

Prizes

Reality Check Award — future Bitcoin++ ticket 1 satoshis

One ticket to a future Bitcoin++ event for each winning team member.

[ Award ]

Best Design

Blockstream Jade Hardware Wallet - For the project with the most intuitive, polished, and visually appealing user experience.

§ The judges

7 judges.

Scoring is handled by the assigned hackathon judges.

JUDGE #01

§ Featured builds

Built in public.

Winning and featured projects from this hackathon. Explore the full gallery →

★ 1st Overall★ Best Design

Artmak

Unassigned

A Bitcoin Ark wallet implemented as performance art

arkarkadeosbitcoinreacttypescript

Demo Docs

★ Best use of STARKs

Bridgestr

Unassigned

Bidirectional bitcoin and nostr mempool project

boltnlnewreplit

Docs

★ 2nd Overall

Core LLM

Unassigned

LLM trained specifically on the Bitcoin Core codebase that gives specific answers to train and educate users on how bitcoin _really_ works.

aic++python

Docs

§ Project gallery