Great writeup. I think you hit the nail on the head by identifying several key components of a good hackathon experience. I think you might be asking yourself

Great writeup. I think you hit the nail on the head by identifying several key components of a good hackathon experience. I think you might be asking yourself the wrong question when you go to these events though. Over the past two years, I've noticed that the ratio of prizes to teams at any given hackathon has been approaching 1:2. All that means is that "winning" in the sense of getting a prize is becoming more and more common. It leaves me wondering if the people who are winning these events now are getting the same amount of benefit as the people who were winning when I first started out. Thus, I think the more important question that people should be asking is "How do I get the best experience out of this event?". I think your writeup did a great job of nailing exactly how to do that: 1. Work with a team with a varied skillset 2. Demoing what you made 3. Work on something you're passionate about 4. Keep things succinct and manageable