New in Devpost for Teams: Hackathon surveys, guest judging, and more guest management features

In this quarter’s update, we're excited to roll out Devpost for Teams (DFT) updates focused on helping you measure results, improve guest management, and give you more control over your private events.

Let's dive into what's new in Q2!

Missed the last update? Check it out here.

Collect feedback easily with Post-Hackathon Surveys

Collecting participant feedback after your hackathon is now simpler than ever with our new customizable survey feature. You no longer need to use external tools to help you report on hackathon outcomes.

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The survey is enabled by default for every new hackathon. You can customize the questions or use the default questions we’ve drafted to work for most hackathons. Surveys are sent automatically after winners are announced, or you can set a custom schedule. You can share surveys via a direct link and also download the responses as a CSV file.

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Improved guest management

We've enhanced guest management to give you even more control and flexibility when collaborating with external participants and judges. Our latest updates simplify the process of bringing in outside expertise and managing all guest interactions within your private hackathons.

Seamlessly including guest judges

Now you can involve external experts in your hackathon judging process with the new Guest Judges feature. This powerful addition ensures you can easily bring in industry leaders or specialists to evaluate projects and provide valuable feedback, all while streamlining your workflow.

To add a guest judge:

1. Invite them as a guest to your hackathon
2. They’ll need to register for the hackathon
3. Go to your hackathon settings and add the guest to the list of judges

Related: Learn more about the judging process for private hackathons.

Additional guest management enhancements

Beyond dedicated guest judges, we've made several broader improvements to our Guest Management features. 

These enhancements are designed to give you more refined control and flexibility over every aspect of guest interaction, from invitation to tracking:

• Guest invite timing: You can now invite guest users until the judging period ends, instead of only until the submission deadline. This is especially helpful if you want to invite guests specifically as judges later in the event cycle.
• Guest access request notifications: Organizers will now receive timely email notifications when guests request access to a DFT hackathon. To avoid too many emails, we bundle requests into a summary email sent a maximum of twice per day. 
• New guest reminders: Easily send reminders to guest users who haven’t registered yet. 
• Streamlined bulk actions: We've added new bulk actions to approve all pending invites and to resend reminders to guest users to register, saving you valuable time.‍
• Guest count visibility: For better oversight, the total count of registered guest users is now prominently shown in the hackathon metrics overview banner.

Clearer hackathon evaluation setup

We've released a new feature that gives you more options for how your hackathons are evaluated in DFT. In the judging settings page, you’ll now see four options:

• Judging and Voting: Projects are evaluated by judges using defined criteria and voted on by participants or a broader audience.
• Judging only: Projects are only evaluated by judges using defined criteria.
• Voting only: Projects are only voted on by fellow participants or a broader audience.
• No evaluation: Projects will not be evaluated within Devpost for Teams (if you’re planning to use your own external method to evaluate submissions). 

When you select an evaluation method, only the relevant tabs will be displayed.

Ready to see these features in action?

Curious to see how these powerful new features can elevate your next private hackathon? We'd love to show you! 

‍Book a personalized demo with our team, and we'll walk you through the platform, answer your questions, and explore how Devpost for Teams can help you achieve your event goals.