TreeHacks 2025
Category: History / Projects Date: February 16–18, 2025 Location: Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA Summary: Jack’s experience at Stanford’s flagship hackathon — going all-in Last updated: 2026-04-06
Overview
TreeHacks is Stanford University’s flagship hackathon, held annually in February. It is one of the most competitive university hackathons in the United States — typically 1,500+ applications for ~500 spots, with strong sponsor presence and a 36-hour build window.
Jack attended TreeHacks 2025 on February 16–18. It is one of three major hackathons documented in his 2024 annual review timeline (alongside Berkeley AI Hackathon June 2024 and HackGT September 2025).
Going Crazy With It
TreeHacks 2025 was a full-send. The 36-hour format forces a specific mode: you don’t sleep much, you scope aggressively, and you build something that can be demoed to a room of judges who have seen 60 other projects that day.
The Berkeley AI Hackathon in June 2024 appears in Jack’s archive as a preceding data point — he went to production for the first time on April 6, 2024, then immediately entered the hackathon circuit. TreeHacks in February 2025 came after CES (January 2025), during the Boston/MIT-connected period.
The specific project Jack built at TreeHacks 2025 is not yet fully documented here — this page will be updated as more details emerge.
The Stanford Context
Stanford’s campus in February: the Oval, the eucalyptus trees, the palm-lined drives. The Main Quad at night during a hackathon has a specific quality — the university is otherwise deserted at 2am, but Huang Engineering Center is fully lit and loud.
TreeHacks is run entirely by students. The logistics are complex (housing 500 hackers overnight, catering, sponsor coordination, hardware lab) and the organizing team treats it seriously. The quality of the event is high in a way that reflects the university it’s hosted at.
Hackathon Philosophy
Jack has a clear pattern with hackathons: he enters them during periods of high momentum, not as a break from work but as an extension of it. Berkeley AI Hackathon came right after going to production. TreeHacks came after CES. HackGT came during the Agentdex build sprint.
This is the correct way to use a hackathon. It’s not a vacation from a project — it’s an external pressure structure that forces scope reduction and shipping. The constraint is the point.
The 36-hour format specifically rewards people who can move fast without panicking — who know what to cut and what to keep, who can demo something that isn’t finished and make the judges believe in the direction.
The Hackathon Circuit
| Hackathon | Date | Location |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley AI Hackathon | June 2024 | UC Berkeley |
| TreeHacks | Feb 16–18, 2025 | Stanford University |
| HackGT | Sep 2025 | Georgia Tech Era |
Three of the most technically credentialed university hackathons in the US, back to back. The pattern is not random.