ETHSF 2025: Painting Ethereum all over San Francisco

ETHSF 2025: Coming together in San Francisco

ETHSF 2025 marked a defining moment for all Ethereum builders in San Francisco and beyond. For the first time, we hosted an Ethereum-focused event in a city that’s shaped so much of the technology that surrounds us today, and it felt overdue. Across a week of workshops, talks, and hacking, what resulted wasn’t just new ideas, but whole new wave of momentum.

We gathered to question, explore, and rebuild what Ethereum could mean. There was a shared clarity among everyone: Ethereum has more to offer, and we’re nowhere near done. Builders coming together not just to ship, but to re-think and refine the wheel. We’re glad to have played a part in moving the conversation forward, along with our phenomenal partners the Ethereum Ecosystem Fund and the Blockchain Builders Fund.

Day 1: Kicking Off on a High Note!

ETHSF 2025 opened with the kind of energy you want at the start of a builder-focused week: honest, thoughtful, and quietly ambitious. The opening ceremony set the tone with a stacked panel featuring Vitalik Buterin (Co-Founder, Ethereum), Tomasz Stanczak (Founder, Nethermind & Co-Director, Ethereum Foundation), and other longtime contributors to the ecosystem. They dug into real challenges facing Ethereum today, and what it’ll take to move the needle.

We also saw live demos from teams across the stack. Nemil Dalal (Coinbase Developer Platform), Tom Vieira (Base), Aayush Gupta (ZKEmail), and Henri Binsztok (OKContract) offered a glimpse into what’s landing next in usability, infra, and privacy. Denver D’souza (Devfolio), walked took us through the Main ETHSF hackathon tracks, joined by Vitalik to reveal a dedicated d/acc track, inviting builders to focus on accelerating decentralized, defensive, and democratic technologies.

The ETHSF Hackathon  👨🏼‍💻

The ETHSF hackathon, happening througout the week had $40,000+ up for grabs for the best ideas and 6 days to execute them. 150+ builders joined the challenge to build across dapps across, infra, d/acc, onchain consumer experiences, universal prediction markets and more.

The Celo Office became ETHSF builders’ tinkering lab for the hackers—part co-working space, part playground for ideas. Builders came in throughout the week for impromptu brainstorms, heads-down sprints, and plenty of good-coffee-fueled iterations. Huge thanks to the Celo team for not just opening up their space for us, but adding so much warmth and delicious food in the mix.

At Standford: Community Day and AI x Blockchain Summit 🍀

At Stanford, we had the chance to tap into one of the most thoughtful and forward-looking communities in tech. Across both Community Day and the AI x Blockchain Summit, builders, researchers, and students came together for real conversations—grounded in both theory and application.

The sessions dove into what’s evolving at the intersection of AI and Ethereum, and what needs rethinking. From scalable ML infrastructure to decentralized data privacy, the dialogue moved fast, but stayed grounded in first principles.

The event also sparked new bridges—between academia and startups, and future collaborators reminding us that the Ethereum ecosystem is a part of a broader movement to build systems that are transparent, robust, and human-aligned. As AI tools grow more powerful, the importance of open, transparent infrastructure, Ethereum’s turf, becomes even more critical.

Special thanks to Dan Boneh (CS Professor, Stanford), Illia Polosukhin (Co-Founder, Near), Sean Ren (CS Professor at USC & Co-Founder of Sahara AI), and many more speakers for anchoring the conversations with depth and clarity.

🫡 d/acc Day at UC Berekley

As the first d/acc gathering of the year, the d/add Day brought together researchers, founders, and technologists to explore how we accelerate innovation without giving up core values like decentralization, defense, and democratic governance.

Led by Vitalik Buterin, d/acc is a call to accelerate technology without compromising decentralization, defense, or democratic participation—pushing back against models that default to centralized control.

Co-hosted with Berkeley RDI, which has been at the forefront of decentralized AI and blockchain research since 2021, the day featured voices like Allison Duettmann (Foresight Institute),  Dan Boneh (CS Professor, Stanford), Michael Gao (cryptographic hardware), Juan Benet, and others helping define the edges of what’s possible and responsible.

From rethinking digital infrastructure to exploring how AI and neurotech can align with Ethereum values, this was a reminder that acceleration is only worth chasing if it brings more people along.

Final Project Pitches & Closing The Week! 🙇🏼 ****

As ETHSF 2025 came to an end, we gathered for a final day of celebration, reflection, and groundbreaking ideas. Demo Day brought the spotlight to the top 6 teams—who presented their projects to a room full of builders, mentors, and longtime Ethereum contributors–to compete for top 3!

It was a culmination of the work, the late nights, and the energy shared throughout the week. We closed strong with a Fireside Chat featuring Vitalik Buterin, joined by Tomasz Stanczak, and insightful talks from Michael Heinrich (Co-Founder, 0G), Jill Gunter (Chief Strategy Officer, Espresso Systems), and YQ (Founder, AltLayer).

ETHSF 2025 Hackathon Winners 🎉

🏆 Best d/acc Project → Swiish Money by Filipe and Antonio 💸

Send crypto to any passport number – no wallet, no hassle. It makes crypto more accessible to everyday users, bringing it closer to being used as real-world money.

🔗 → https://devfolio.co/projects/swiish-money-1d0e

🏆 Best Infra Project → Footsteps by Cesar Huret 🏃

A serverless zk powered game where players have to find each other just by knowing half of their enemy's footstep trail produced every 5 seconds.

🔗 → https://devfolio.co/projects/footsteps-312d

🏆 Best App → Stamps by Jonathan Cruz 🗺️

Onchain travel stamps that prove where you've been, let you attach memories, and unlock real-world rewards like redeemable Sky Miles and more.

🔗 → https://devfolio.co/projects/stamps-9ec6

Looking Ahead: ETHSF 2026 & Beyond ✈️

As we wrap up ETHSF 2025, there’s a strong sense of momentum. A reminder that even in a space as fast-moving as Ethereum, there’s still room to slow down, think deeply, and build with intention. When the right people come together, familiar problems start to look like new opportunities.

ETHSF 2026 is already on the horizon. And if this week showed us anything, it’s that the journey of building resilient, usable, and decentralized systems is just getting started.

Here’s to all the builders who are curious to question, experiment, and always up for a challenge. The journey continues and we will see you next year!

Massive Thank You to the ETHSF Sponsors And Partners! 🫶🏼

A huge thank you to the ETHSF sponsors and partners who helped make this week possible. ETHSF was supported by hackathon and venue sponsors like Reactive Network, Base, Coinbase Developer Platform, ZetaChain, Celo, and Self Protocol. Our event sponsors included Nethermind, Altlayer, EigenLayer, Metamask, Sahara AI, Nexus, Caldera, and Edge.

We were proud to have NYSE Wired as our media partner, with academic support from the Stanford Center for Blockchain Research and Berkeley RDI. A bih thank you to our community partners included the Stanford Blockchain Accelerator, Stanford Blockchain Club, Berkeley Blockchain Club, SF Ethereum Developers, and EduDAO, media partner NYSE Wired, and academic partners Stanford Center for Blockchain Research and Berkeley RDI. 🫶🏼

We hope to see you around at upcoming Devfolio hackathons! :)

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Until then, Never Stop Building 🛠️