Illuminated Interaction
The winner was awarded a $500 ($500 value)
Pop Culture Creation
The winner was awarded a $500 ($500 value)
Gamer's Gambit
The winner was awarded a $500 ($500 value)
Overview
Calling every creator on Hackster! It’s time to raid your junk drawers, scavenge your workbenches, and unleash your imagination because our annual year-end Junk Drawer Competition is officially back! This is your chance to finish 2025 with a creative bang and show the world what you can do with a little determination and a bin full of random parts.
This competition is all about giving those half-baked, half-built, or half-dreamed projects the love they deserve. Got a robot that’s been gathering dust? A gadget that didn’t quite work out (but could with a little TLC)? Or maybe just a wild idea you’ve been too busy to start? Let’s make it happen—and maybe win a reward too!
The annual Junk Drawer Competition is here to celebrate the messy, chaotic, and joyful process of turning forgotten ideas into tangible creations. Whether you’re resurrecting a project or starting something totally new, we’re cheering you on every step of the way. This isn’t about being perfect—it’s about having fun, experimenting, and sharing your journey.
You can submit up to three new projects to this competition.
Why You Should Enter
- Bring that super cool unfinished project or idea back to life.
- Close out a busy year with some light-hearted fun by celebrating the maker spirit.
- Win cool prizes (and bragging rights).
- Start 2026 off strong with one new years resolution already complete!
Prizes
End your year with a new project! Our judges are going to pick the best qualifying projects based on the judging criteria outlined in the rules section.
Illuminated Interaction
Projects that use LEDs as an interactive medium. This includes touch-responsive sculptures, audio-reactive installations, proximity-sensing lights, or expressive LED objects that change based on user behavior or environmental data. From large-scale public artworks to warm, glowing smart-home lamps to wearable LED outfits...if it lights up and shines bright, we want to see it!
Pop Culture Creation
Create the most innovative, relevant, and fun creation related to pop culture! Your creation can be inspired by a big (or small) moment in pop culture, such as a basketball player that dunks a cookie in milk, your own high tech version of Barbie and her dream (smart) house, a fart machine that is synced to your favorite chart-topping song, or a tricked out version of your favorite movie or tv prop.
Gamer's Gambit
Enhance your gaming experience using any of the five senses (sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch) or create your own unique game. For example, you could enhance a haptic chair, enable a motion tracker for gesture based gaming, develop a wind machine to stay cool, create a custom game controller, set up a scent machine, design a head tracking device, or make your own custom game.
Judges
To keep things extra fun, we’ve got three quirky prize categories, each dreamed up by a Hackster team member or Hackster Pro. They’ve picked the theme and the prize and will be your judge, jury, and (hopefully not) executioner. Check out the prize categories a little further down the page. There’s a category for everyone, so find one that fits you and go for it! Feel free to tag the judging staff member in a discussion thread to learn what they would love to see.
Learn more about Hackster Pro Will Donaldson on his website and follow him on Hackster.
Contest Status
Timeline
Competition begins
December 2, 2025 at 12:00 PM PST
Submissions close
January 13, 2026 at 11:59 PM PST
Winners announced by
Feb 13, 2026