BRING A CHALLENGE · BUILD 2026

Do you have a challenge that tech could help solve? Bring it to BUILD 2026.

A UK weekend of builders, ready to take on a real problem from your charity, church, ministry, kingdom-focused business, or your own project.

When
Fri 9 - Sat 10 October 2026
Where
Here East, London
Submissions close
31 July 2026
Submit a challenge → Back to BUILD
A UK weekend of builders

You bring the problem. We bring the people.

BUILD 2026 is a UK-wide weekend event where developers, designers, product managers and anyone who loves tech give their time to work on real challenges facing charities, churches, kingdom-focused organisations, and individuals with a project they care about.

It brings together participants from FaithTech communities across the UK. FaithTech is a global community of Christians working in and around technology, and we exist to connect faith and tech for the good of the world.

01 — Format

What is a hackathon?

A hackathon is a focused two-day sprint where teams come together to solve challenges, in our case using technology redemptively. It is about making real progress on something that matters: exploring ideas and building solutions.

It runs around the clock. Some teams even choose to work straight through the night.

You do not need to be technical to bring a challenge. You just need a real problem, and the willingness to work alongside a team for a weekend.

02 — Why submit

A dedicated team, focused on your problem.

Each accepted challenge gets its own dedicated team spending the entire weekend focused on your problem. By Saturday evening you will have explored solutions and likely have a prototype, proof of concept, or even a working solution to take forward.

~100
Builders from FaithTech communities across the UK
~10
Teams, each focused on one challenge
30hrs
Of dedicated time on your problem
£1.5m+
Raised by past projects after the event

On Saturday evening, every team presents what they have built to an open audience of supporters and guests. It is a real moment of recognition for the work your challenge inspires.

03 — Criteria

What makes a good challenge?

A challenge can come from:

What ties them together is purpose: each one serves a social good or missional need in the community. Beyond that, the strongest challenges share three things.

01 — REAL
It's real
Something you or your organisation is actually working on, not a hypothetical. The more grounded in reality, the better the output.
02 — FOCUSED
It's focused
A team can make meaningful progress in two days if the problem is reasonably scoped. Broad ambitions are fine, but a clear starting point helps.
03 — LASTING
It has a life after
The hackathon is a boost, not the destination. We want to work on things that will keep going beyond the weekend.
Not sure if your idea is the right shape? Submit it anyway. We review everything and will work with you to get it ready.
Does it need to involve coding? Not necessarily. Some of the most valuable work at these events is research, design, strategy or process mapping. If there is a tech angle somewhere, that is enough.
04 — Commitments

What you commit to.

It's free to submit a challenge. Project owners do need to attend the event and purchase a ticket (full event, Friday to Saturday).
05 — Timeline

Key dates.

06 — After the weekend

What happens next?

You will leave the weekend with real progress on your challenge. Some teams love the challenge so much they will want to keep contributing, and you are welcome to encourage that. In other cases you take what has been built and carry it forward, which is why it is so helpful to have someone technical from your team who can continue the work in your organisation.

Either way, the time teams spend at a BUILD weekend is free, and there is no expectation that you fund anything afterwards.

07 — Previous BUILDs

From previous BUILD events.

A few of the projects that have come out of past weekends and kept going.

AI FOR CASEWORK
Paper Path
AI tool for Christians Against Poverty caseworkers to manage and hand over case notes.
FOOD BANKS
Bankuet
Digital platform that turns donations into what UK food banks actually need.
CHURCH
Breeze Translate
Live translation for multilingual church services.
YOUTH · VR / AR
Missional Generation
VR and AR experiences helping young people explore faith.

Ready to submit your challenge?

It takes about 10 minutes. Submissions close 31 July 2026.

Submit a challenge →

Questions first? Email london@faithtech.com