Create the Future Design Contest 2026

The 2026 Create the Future Design Contest is now open for entries! Submit your game-changing new product ideas for a chance at the $25,000 grand prize. $50,000 in total prize value.

Since Tech Briefs magazine launched the Create the Future Design contest in 2002 to recognize and reward engineering innovation, over 16,000 design ideas have been submitted by engineers, students, and entrepreneurs in more than 100 countries. Join the innovators who dared to dream big by entering your ideas in our 2026 contest.

The Contest opens for entries on March 2, 2026 and closes July 1, 2026 (referred to herein as the Contest Live Period). Entries must be received by 11:59 pm EDT on July 1, 2026. For your entries to qualify for consideration, you must meet the following requirements:

• Complete the Official Entry Form and upload at least one image with your entry.
• Choose one of seven categories for your entry:
  • Aerospace & Defense — Product innovations with applications in the aviation, space, and/or defense/military markets.
  • Automotive/Transportation — Products that enable and improve mobility on the ground, in the air, or at sea.
  • Electronics — Products that improve computing, communications, sensing, test, and other fields that rely on advances in electronic components, boards and systems; products that enable an interconnected world.
  • Energy, Power & Propulsion — Products and systems that generate and deliver energy to propel vehicles on the ground, at sea, and in the air or space; that enable energy-efficient home/consumer and business/industrial power applications; or solutions for advanced energy storage.
  • Manufacturing & Materials — Products and processes that speed or streamline manufacturing and production; advances in materials and materials processing.
  • Medical — Devices and systems that improve the efficiency/quality of healthcare and save or improve lives; advances in bio-medicine and drug design.
  • Robotics & Automation — The design of machines that help/assist humans in a variety of fields; the application of technology, including artificial intelligence and machine learning, to automate tasks that are inefficient, difficult, or impossible for humans to perform.
• Provide a description of your entry (up to 500 words) in the form of a technical abstract, in English. Your description should cover how the entry works, what makes it novel, how it would be produced, and where it would be applied. Entries will be judged on these criteria:
  • Innovation (50% of score) — Is the design novel? Does it represent an important advance over the current state of the art?
  • Feasibility/Manufacturability (25%) — How easy would it be to implement? Could it be cost-effectively manufactured/produced? Has it been demonstrated to work? (Please note: prototypes are NOT required.)
  • Marketability (25%) — Does the idea have practical applications? Is there a well-defined market for its use?
• Upload at least one (but no more than three) visual illustrations. File type options:
  • PDF(single-page), GIF, JPEG, or PNG. The visual illustration(s) should complement your entry description and can be drawings, photos, charts, or models. File size should be kept under 2MB per illustration. Larger files can cause the entry form upload to time out.