Welcome! 🎯 Today you're going to build an AI-powered product in just 2 hours. This guide walks you through a structured approach: pick a problem, define it with Claude, ideate solutions, scope ruthlessly, build with a clear spec, and demo what you've made.
The secret: Structure beats speed. A clear spec written first will always beat jumping straight into code.
📅 Your Day: Kick Off → Use Case Voting → Hour 1: Build → Hour 2: Build → Demos → Winner Announced
Step 1: What's Your Mission? 🎯
Pick one of our three starter ideas, or bring your own. Click a card to select it and pre-fill your use case description.
🏆
World Cup Predictor
Let users enter predictions for every fixture, track how right they are as the tournament progresses, and make the experience genuinely fun and engaging.
🗳️
Your Political Twin
Present users with real parliamentary votes, ask how they'd vote, match them to their closest MP and party. Use Claude to translate dense motion text into plain English on the fly.
🍳
AI Sous Chef
User inputs what's actually in their fridge and cupboards. Claude generates a real, cookable recipe using only those ingredients. Reduce food waste with AI.
📝 Your Mission: Fill in both fields below. If you pick a card, its description auto-fills — but you can customise it. Then tell us what APIs or data sources you have access to.
Step 2: Run the Starter Prompt 🚀
Copy this prompt. Paste it into Claude Projects and answer the 3 questions Claude asks. Take ~20 minutes for this stage.
I'm taking part in a hackathon today. My goal is to build:
[DESCRIBE YOUR USE CASE IN 1-2 SENTENCES]
Before I write a single line of code, I want to work through a structured process with you to produce a clear plan.
We're going to work through 3 stages together:
STAGE 1 - DISCOVER & DEFINE
Understand the problem, the user, and what success looks like today.
STAGE 2 - IDEATE & PROTOTYPE
Explore what to build, make decisions about scope, and agree on the core features for a 2 hour build.
STAGE 3 - BUILD & ITERATE
Produce a clear, structured PRD I can hand directly to Claude Code to start building from.
We will not move to the next stage until we've reviewed and agreed what we have. At each stage, summarise what we've decided before moving on.
CONTEXT:
This is a hackathon – not production software. It needs to work and demonstrate the idea, nothing more.
I have approximately 2 hours to build.
The APIs and data sources available to me are:
[LIST YOUR APIs AND DATA SOURCES HERE]
I can use any other free public APIs or data sources I choose.
The finished PRD should be specific enough that an AI coding agent can build it iteratively without ambiguity.
TO START:
Do not jump to solutions yet. Begin Stage 1 – ask me up to 3 questions to understand what I want to build and what a great outcome looks like for me today.
👇 Your Action: Run the prompt above in Claude Projects. Claude will ask you 3 questions. Answer them to kick off Stage 1 of Discovery & Define. Then come back here and paste Claude's summary of your answers.
Step 3: Discover & Define 🔍
Claude has already started Stage 1. Now deepen it — ask Claude for more context, validate your assumptions, nail down your user's true pain point.
Continue Stage 1 - Discover & Define.
Based on what we've discussed so far, ask me 2-3 deeper questions about:
- The specific user frustration or pain point we're solving
- What success looks like (what does the user get out of this, really?)
- Any constraints or assumptions we need to validate
Then, based on my answers, write a one-paragraph summary of:
1. The user's core problem
2. What our product does (1 sentence)
3. What success looks like at demo time
👇 Your Action: Run this prompt in the same Claude Projects thread. Let Claude ask the deeper questions, answer them, then come back and paste the summary paragraph here.
Step 4: Ideate & Scope 💡
Now you know what you're solving for. Time to scope ruthlessly. What's the minimum feature set that ships in 2 hours and proves the idea?
Now move to Stage 2 - Ideate & Prototype.
First, brainstorm 8-10 feature ideas that could solve this problem. For each, write:
- Feature name
- What it does (1 sentence)
- Rough effort: Low / Medium / High
Then, based on the time constraint (2 hours), recommend which features form the BASE (must-have), STRETCH (nice-to-have), and WILDCARD (if we're flying).
Base should be genuinely buildable in 2 hours and prove the core idea.
Stretch adds value without breaking the 2-hour window if you're ahead.
Wildcard is only if Base + Stretch are somehow done early.
👇 Your Action: Run this prompt. Claude will brainstorm features and help you tier them. Paste the final tier breakdown here.
Step 5: Build & PRD 🛠️
You've defined the problem and scoped the solution. Now you need a crystal-clear PRD that Claude Code can build from without ambiguity.
💡 Pro Tip: The best hack teams write a CLAUDE.md file at their repo root. It's a single markdown file that holds:
Architecture: How the pieces fit together
Data schema: What data structure you're using
API endpoints: What your backend will do (if you have one)
Key decisions: Why you chose this over that
This PRD: The exact spec to build from
This file carries full context between Claude Code sessions. No lost context. One file, complete architecture.
Move to Stage 3 - Build & Iterate. Create a PRD (Product Requirements Document).
Format it like this:
# [Product Name]
## What is this?
[1-sentence summary]
## For whom?
[Persona: age, occupation, niche interest, what they're trying to achieve]
## What's the problem they have?
[The pain point you're solving]
## How does it solve the problem?
[How your product works, user's journey, key interactions]
## What are we building? (Features)
### BASE - Must have (2 hour build)
- [Feature]: [What it does, acceptance criteria]
- [Feature]: [What it does, acceptance criteria]
### STRETCH - Nice to have
- [Feature]: [What it does]
### WILDCARD - If we're flying
- [Feature]: [What it does]
## Tech stack & data
- Frontend: [e.g. React, Vue, plain HTML+JS]
- Backend (if any): [e.g. Node/Express, Python/Flask, Firebase, Supabase]
- Key APIs: [What you'll call]
- Data storage: [How you'll persist data]
## Acceptance criteria - What does "done" look like?
- [ ] Feature 1 works end-to-end
- [ ] Feature 2 works end-to-end
- [ ] Can demo it in 2 minutes
- [ ] UI is navigable and makes sense
Generate this PRD now. Make it specific enough that a developer can start coding immediately without asking questions.
👇 Your Action: Run this prompt. Claude will generate a complete PRD. Paste it here, then save it to CLAUDE.md at the root of your new repo. That file is now your source of truth for the build.