Devpost vs. AngelHack

Devpost is the best hackathon platform for organizations running public, developer-facing hackathons, and has been since 2009. Organizers can run a hackathon on Devpost fully self-serve, or add Devpost's project management and marketing teams for anywhere from occasional support to full, hands-off execution. That range, from fully self-serve to fully managed, means organizers with different budgets and different levels of internal resources can all run a strong hackathon on Devpost, whether hands-on or hands-off.

AngelHack, founded in 2011, is largely built around in-person events. It's an agency that plans, staffs, and runs on-site venue logistics for hackathons. Its developer community is around 300,000, and organizers who host through AngelHack rely on its team to plan and run the program, including hybrid and virtual formats, rather than operating a platform of their own.

Here's how the two compare across their offerings.

Community and audience

Devpost puts organizers in front of one of the largest hackathon-specific audiences anywhere, a 6M+ community of builders and developers. That reach is backed by long-standing enterprise partnerships, including Google (since 2019), Amazon (since 2016), and Microsoft (since 2016). Devpost hackathons also see a 5-33% registration-to-submission rate, well above the roughly 1% typical for developer marketing channels like ads, banners, and conference sponsorships. Developers recommend Devpost on their own, too. It's a name that comes up often in hackathon discussions on Reddit and other community forums. For organizers, Devpost's community size and reputation translate directly into a hackathon people actually show up for, rather than one built around a smaller or less established audience.

AngelHack's community is smaller, listed at 300K+ developers across 100+ cities worldwide. AngelHack’s community was built over more than a decade of running hackathons, quests, and bounty programs since its 2011 founding. 

Platform features

Hackathon organizers can use Devpost's platform directly, either fully self-serve or with Devpost's added support. AngelHack's equivalent functions are delivered by its own team as part of the hosting engagement, running on AngelHack's proprietary platform, StackUp, rather than something an organizer operates independently. Here's how the two compare across features.

Event formats

Devpost supports virtual, in-person, and hybrid hackathons.

AngelHack also supports virtual, in-person, and hybrid hackathons.

Registration, team formation, and submissions

On Devpost, participants register, form teams, and submit projects directly on the platform. The hackathon page clearly outlines submission requirements, and participants use Devpost to describe their project, attach media, and submit it for judging. After registering, someone looking for teammates can list themselves on the hackathon's Participants page, describe what kind of collaborator they want, and send a Team-up request. Once the other participant accepts by adding them to the project, the team is set. Devpost also runs a dedicated Discord channel for participants still looking for teammates. 

AngelHack's hackathon platform service, delivered on StackUp, centralizes registration, team formation, and submission management on AngelHack's behalf as part of its managed engagement. Its public materials describe these as capabilities the platform provides during a program rather than a self-serve tool organizers configure and run themselves, and they don't detail a participant-facing team-matching feature comparable to Devpost's Participants page or Team-up requests.

Project galleries and analytics

Every project submitted on Devpost stays visible in the public project gallery after the hackathon ends, which gives organizers a permanent record of what got built and gives participants a lasting showcase of their work. Winning projects display a winner's badge once results are announced, and Devpost user profiles list every project they've submitted. Organizers can export their own reports at any point, covering registration and submission counts, participant demographics, project themes, and any custom registration or submission questions they added. Devpost also provides organizers with comprehensive wrap-up reports as part of its project management and marketing services.

AngelHack's platform includes analytics and reporting as part of its service, and its team compiles post-event metrics and recommendations for the organizer. Its public materials don't describe a persistent, participant-facing project gallery or a self-serve analytics dashboard comparable to Devpost's exports. Reporting comes from AngelHack's team as a deliverable, rather than something an organizer can access directly.

Security and compliance

Devpost is ISO 27001 and SOC 2 certified.

AngelHack does not publish a specific security certification, such as SOC 2 or ISO 27001, anywhere on its site or in its terms and privacy documentation.

Managed services and support

Organizers decide how much help they want from Devpost. The platform can work fully self-serve, or organizers can add Devpost's managed services on top, delivered by a team of hackathon consultants who plan and run hackathons full time. That team specializes in this niche field and has a long history of supporting a wide range of hackathon formats and programs, from single-company challenges to large, multi-sponsor events. Project management support (Basic, Mid, or Full) covers planning and running the event, and marketing support (Basic, Mid, Full, or Max) helps reach Devpost's users and broader developer communities. 

AngelHack's whole model is a managed service. Its team designs the program, runs day-to-day operations and vendor coordination, supplies the platform, and, for in-person and hybrid events, sets up and staffs the venue itself.

Judging

Judging on Devpost happens directly on the platform. Judges score each submission against the hackathon's own criteria on a scale from a dedicated dashboard, and can recuse themselves from a project if they have a conflict of interest. Organizers can add submission screening through Devpost's managed services so only eligible projects reach judges, and can watch judges' progress from their own dashboard for the length of the judging period.

As part of its hackathon management service, AngelHack's team runs judging and scoring for the organizer. AngelHack's public materials don't describe a self-serve judging tool or an organizer-facing judging dashboard the way Devpost does. Judging on an AngelHack-run hackathon is something its team carries out on the organizer's behalf, not software the organizer or its judges use directly.

Pricing model

Devpost's pricing scales with what an organizer needs. Running a hackathon self-serve costs a flat fee, and organizers can layer on managed services, project management (Basic, Mid, or Full) and marketing support (Basic, Mid, Full, or Max), for more reach and hands-on help. Devpost is free to use for student hackathons, where the organizers and participants are all students.

AngelHack doesn't publish a rate card or fixed pricing tiers. Pricing is set case by case, since engagements are scoped to whichever mix of program design, marketing, operations, platform, and event setup an organizer selects, anywhere from a single service to full delivery. For a full-scale, full-service program, AngelHack has quoted $200K or more, more than most hackathons cost to run on Devpost.

Best for

Devpost is best for organizations running a public, developer-facing hackathon on any theme who want a platform they can operate on their own, with the option to add Devpost's project management or marketing teams for more support, all while reaching a large, established developer and builder community.

AngelHack is best for organizations running complicated in-person or hybrid hackathons that require support with venue logistics.

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