2022 Hackaday Prize: Save The World Wildcard Challenge Begins Now

If you’ve ever looked at a global problem and thought, “I could fix that… with a microcontroller and a suspicious amount
of zip ties,” congratulations: you are exactly the kind of person the 2022 Hackaday Prize is built for.
And if you missed the earlier rounds (or your project is too weird, too ambitious, or too gloriously cross-category to
fit anywhere), the Save the World Wildcard is your late-season comeback tour.

The headline version: the wildcard round is the final challenge of the 2022 Hackaday Prize, and it’s the “anything goes”
laneas long as your hardware is aimed at making the world better. Think of it as the contest equivalent of cleaning your
workbench by shoving everything into one box labeled “IMPORTANT.”

What the 2022 Hackaday Prize is really about (and why the wildcard matters)

The 2022 Hackaday Prize centered on big ideas like sustainability, resiliency, and
circularitynot as buzzwords, but as a build prompt. Throughout the year, the contest ran multiple themed
rounds that pushed makers toward practical hardware: cleaner power, smarter recycling, keeping old tech out of landfills,
and tools that help communities handle climate-related disruptions.

The problem with themed rounds is that reality refuses to stay in tidy categories. Some projects are equal parts energy,
repair, sensing, and community infrastructure. Others are niche solutions that don’t match a single headline themebut
still hit hard on real-world impact. That’s where the Save the World Wildcard steps in: it’s the safety
net for the genuinely important (and delightfully unclassifiable).

So what is the “Save the World Wildcard,” exactly?

The wildcard round invites you to choose a problem facing the world today and build the
boldest hardware solution you can reasonably document. It’s not “anything goes” as in “my RGB desk toy
brings me joy, therefore it saves the world.” It’s “anything goes” as in “pick a real problem and make a credible,
buildable device or module that moves the needle.”

The spirit of the wildcard: impact first, category second

A strong wildcard entry usually has three traits:

• A clear target user (a community, a worker, a household, a field team, a school, a clinic).
• A measurable outcome (reduced waste, lower energy cost, safer water, better access, faster response).
• A path to reality (parts, build steps, test results, and a plan that doesn’t require magic).

In other words: you’re not just building a prototypeyou’re building a story the judges (and the community) can follow from
“problem” to “proof.”

“Begins now” the timeline (and the part where dates got spicy)

The wildcard entry period opened in early September 2022. The Hackaday announcement post described the wildcard round as
running through mid-Octoberbut the official rules were later updated due to a schedule change for the awards ceremony.

Wildcard dates to know

• Opens: September 4, 2022 (Pacific Time)
• Originally publicized close: October 16, 2022
• Updated official close: October 9, 2022 (per updated rules)
• Final round materials snapshot deadline: October 23, 2022 (per updated rules)
• Winners announced: around November 5, 2022 (aligned with Supercon timing)

Translation: if you were building to the earlier “mid-October” finish line, the updated rules effectively moved the tape
closer. In contest terms, that’s a jump scare. In maker terms, it’s “guess I’m writing my documentation tonight.”

How to enter (without getting rejected for avoidable reasons)

The Hackaday Prize is famously documentation-forward. You can have the most heroic hardware on Earth, but if your project
page looks like a mystery novel with all the pages missing, you’re not doing yourself any favors.

Core entry requirements you should treat like oxygen

• Create a Hackaday.io personal profile and a project profile.
• Explain the challenge your project addresses and how it helps solve it.
• Include at least one illustrative image (sketch, schematic, rendering, diagramanything that clarifies intent).
• Link to any relevant repositories and clearly state licenses (open source is strongly preferred).
• Submit the project to the prize via the “Submit project to…” option on Hackaday.io.
• Post at least two project log/instruction updates (show progress, not just vibes).

There were also specific rules for minors (13+ could participate with a parent/guardian consent process), and the contest
emphasized that submissions must be in English and follow the published requirements.

What judges look for (a.k.a. how to make your project page judge-friendly)

The judging criteria can be summarized as: does it work, can others follow it, and could it exist in the real world?
A good wildcard entry doesn’t just propose a solutionit demonstrates seriousness through design decisions, testing, and documentation.

Four practical signals judges reward

1. Effectiveness: Does this actually address the problem it claims to?
2. Documentation quality: Are the design process and decisions explained clearly?
3. Manufacturability: Is there evidence the design could be reproduced (materials, methods, constraints)?
4. Completeness: Is this a coherent system with a reasonable level of finish for the stage it’s in?

If you want a cheat code: write your page like you’re onboarding a smart teammate who will build Version 2 while you sleep.
(Also: please sleep. You are not a LiPo battery. You cannot safely run at 100% forever.)

Choosing a “save the world” problem without boiling the ocean

Wildcard projects can be massive, but the best ones usually start narrow: a specific pain point, a specific environment,
and a specific user. Then they scale impact through replication and openness.

High-impact directions that fit the wildcard spirit

• Clean energy in the real world: low-cost harvesting, storage improvements, ruggedized microgrids.
• Waste and circularity: repair tools, recycling automation, upcycling systems, material tracking.
• Environmental sensing: air/water monitoring that’s affordable, deployable, and understandable.
• Disaster resilience: communications, power, mapping, early warning, field-ready diagnostics.
• Health and safety hardware: low-resource screening tools, protective devices, accessibility tech.
• Food and agriculture: irrigation efficiency, soil sensing, pest prevention, post-harvest preservation.

A simple framework to keep your build grounded

1. State the problem in one sentence. If it takes a paragraph, you’re still brainstorming.
2. Name the user. “People” is not a user. “Coastal citizen scientists” is a user.
3. Define success metrics. Cost target, power budget, accuracy, throughput, durability, ease of assembly.
4. Pick a minimum viable prototype. One subsystem that proves the core claim.
5. Document relentlessly. Your logs are not decorationthey’re your proof.

Examples from the 2022 wildcard ecosystem (to show how wide “wildcard” can be)

One of the easiest ways to understand the wildcard round is to look at the kinds of projects it elevated. The finalists
spanned oceans, air quality, recycling, and public healthunited by clear missions and solid execution.

A few standout directions (and what you can learn from them)

• Ocean and ecosystem tools: Projects like an underwater robotic collector aimed at ecological imbalance
  show how “save the world” can be specific, physical, and field-ready.
• Citizen science instrumentation: Low-cost sensing platforms for measuring real environmental data make
  impact by enabling more people to participate (and verify).
• Recycling and reuse hardware: Large-format systems that turn plastic waste into usable output demonstrate
  circularity in a way that’s hard to argue with: waste in, useful stuff out.
• Air quality awareness tools: Interactive maps and monitors help communities understand what they’re
  breathingand advocate with data instead of guesswork.
• Public health protection devices: Practical interventions (even small ones) can matter when they scale.

Notice what’s missing: vague “someday this could help” energy. The best entries pair big goals with a prototype that
demonstrates credibility right now.

Documentation that wins: make your project page do the heavy lifting

In the Hackaday Prize universe, documentation isn’t paperworkit’s your product. Your project page should make it easy to
answer: What is it? Why does it matter? How does it work? Can someone reproduce it? What did you learn while building it?

What to include in your logs (so they don’t read like a diary of despair)

• Design decisions: Why this sensor, this MCU, this material?
• Tradeoffs: What did you give up to hit cost/power/durability goals?
• Testing: Even basic validation beats “trust me, bro.” Show numbers when you can.
• Failures: One clean failure write-up can be more impressive than ten vague successes.
• Next steps: A clear roadmap signals you understand what it takes to finish.

Also: take photos like you’re explaining your build to future-you after a long nap. Future-you will not remember where that
one “temporary” wire goes. It’s always temporary. Until it’s the whole project.

Manufacturability for normal humans (not just people with a factory)

You don’t need to mass-produce your wildcard entry, but you should show that you’ve thought about reproducibility:
part availability, assembly complexity, enclosure choices, calibration steps, and cost.

Quick manufacturability upgrades that pay off

• Use modular blocks: power, sensing, compute, comms, enclosuremake them separable.
• Publish a bill of materials (BOM): include alternates for hard-to-source components.
• Design for field repair: screws over glue, connectors over solder blobs, labels over guessing.
• Explain your enclosure logic: weather sealing, airflow, mounting, strain relief.

A wildcard-ready checklist (print this mentally and tape it to your forehead)

1. Problem statement: clear, specific, real.
2. User story: who uses it, where, and why.
3. Prototype evidence: photos, diagrams, tests, logs.
4. Openness: files, repo links, license clarity.
5. Reproducibility: BOM, build steps, parts availability notes.
6. Impact narrative: what changes if this is adopted.
7. Deployment plan: even a small pilot scenario counts.

What happens after the wildcard round?

In the 2022 structure, each challenge round could produce a set of finalists who received cash awards, and finalists moved
forward into the final round. The finals emphasized a working prototype, stronger documentation, and a short video demo.

If you want motivation, look at where the year ultimately landed: the 2022 winners included projects like a
3D printed portable wind turbine, a large-format plastic waste printer, and other designs
aimed at practical sustainability and resilience. Whether or not you win, the contest gives you a platform to attract
collaborators, feedback, and real momentum.

Extra: of real-world “wildcard experience” vibes (the part no datasheet warns you about)

Here’s what building for the Save the World Wildcard often feels likeminus the myth that everyone else has their life
together. First, you start with an idea that sounds simple: “I’ll build a low-cost sensor,” or “I’ll make recycling easier.”
Then reality walks in, sits down at your bench, and starts asking questions like, “What’s your calibration method?” and
“Why does your power budget look like a horror movie?”

The first week is usually optimistic. You order parts, sketch block diagrams, and tell yourself you’ll do the documentation
“as you go.” (Narrator voice: they did not do the documentation as they went.) The second week is where the wildcard magic
begins: your prototype works… sort of. It works on your desk, under perfect lighting, with the cable held at a very specific
angle that you will never be able to recreate. This is also when you discover your “temporary” solution has become a core
structural component.

Then comes the moment that separates strong entries from “cool idea, unclear execution”: you start writing logs that explain
what changed and why. You add photos that show the ugly middle stages. You admit that Version 1 overheated, so you revised
the enclosure. You share a graph that proves your sensor readings stabilize after warm-up. That’s not just storytellingit’s
evidence that your project can survive outside your imagination.

Somewhere around deadline time, you also learn the true meaning of scope management. The wildcard round tempts you to solve
everything: the device, the app, the cloud, the enclosure, the manufacturing plan, the outreach strategy, and world peace.
The best builders pick the one claim that matters most and prove it. Maybe your device doesn’t have a perfect enclosure yet,
but it has repeatable measurements and a reproducible build. Maybe your recycling machine isn’t beautiful, but it turns waste
into output safely and consistently. Judges and readers can forgive “not polished” far more easily than they can forgive
“not demonstrated.”

And the most underrated part? Community feedback. When you publish openly, strangers become teammates: someone suggests a
cheaper part, a safer fuse, a better sensor placement, or a test method you didn’t know existed. The wildcard experience is
a reminder that “save the world” doesn’t always mean “build alone in a garage until you emerge as a legend.” Sometimes it
means inviting others into the processso your project can outgrow you in the best possible way.