Four young people presenting a slide in front of an audience of about 30 listening adults

Summer Make-a-Thon

Each year, during the summer holidays, we host a weekend-long Make-a-Thon in which teams work together to build an innovative solution to a problem.

What is the Summer Make-a-Thon?

The Prewired Summer Make-a-Thon is a 2-day event during the summer holidays, running from 10 to 5 on both Saturday and Sunday. Each year, we have a theme: for example, mental health in 2026 and sustainability in 2025. In a team of 3 or 4, you'll think of a problem that you'd like to create a solution for and then spend the weekend building it. You can use any technology you'd like - whether software-based (Scratch, Python, websites, ...) or hardware-based, using any of the equipment we have available, such as LEGO robotics, BBC micro:bits, or Arduinos. Of course, our volunteer mentors will be there the entire time to help you out.

At the end of the weekend, you'll present your solution to the other attendees as well as a professional jury who will judge each entry. There are many awards to be won and one team will take home the grand prize!

The Make-a-Thon is open to all aged 11-17, regardless of experience.

The 2026 Summer Make-a-Thon happened on 1 and 2 August 2026. See you next year!

Teams of young people sitting at large tables, working on laptops

Creating technology for mental health at the 4th Prewired Summer Make-a-Thon

The 2026 edition of the Summer Make-a-Thon happened on 1 and 2 August. Six teams of teenagers spent the weekend working together to build innovative solutions for mental health issues.

Read the blog post

Make-a-Thon and Summer Hack archive

From 2016 to 2019, we ran week-long Summer Hacks each year. After a break for COVID, we returned in 2023 with the current Make-a-Thon format. See below for impressions of the editions so far:

make-a-thon