VibeFest is San Diego’s least serious, most serious AI event of the year. It’s part trade show, part competition, part excuse to gather every AI enthusiast, builder, lover, hater, follower, influencer, and “I just got into this last week” curious-person under one roof.

Are we serious? Yes. Why do you ask?

We’re here because San Diego deserves to be celebrated, and AI is fundamentally about the vibes — and frankly, nobody’s vibes are better than ours. So we’re throwing the kind of event we wished existed: somewhere you can actually talk to people building real things, learn something, show off your weird side project, and maybe win a deeply cursed trophy.

The Two Main Events

🎪 A.I. Project Showcase Think trade show, minus the lanyards-and-LinkedIn energy. Got a project, a product, a startup, a half-finished demo, or a Claude prompt you’re weirdly proud of? Grab a table and show it off. Talk to people. Get feedback. Maybe find a co-founder. Maybe just find someone who’ll pretend to understand your RAG pipeline.

Doors open at 5:00 PM for setup. Table locations are first come, first served — show up early, pick your spot, plug in.

💚 Slopathon A head-to-head competition to create the sloppiest possible AI creation. The exact deliverable and objective are announced live at the event, so no, you can’t pre-cook anything. The winner is crowned “The Sloppiest San Diegan” — a title of dubious honor and undeniable prestige.

Slopathon kicks off at 6:30 PM sharp. Show up late, slop alone.

The rules: have fun, build something, keep it sloppy.

Who’s this for?

You, probably. Builders, founders, tinkerers, designers, the AI-curious, the AI-skeptical, students, professionals, hobbyists, and anyone who’s ever ended a sentence with “…so I built a little thing.” If you care about what’s happening with AI in San Diego — whether you’re shipping production systems or still figuring out what an embedding is — you belong here.

Why we’re doing this

Because the best parts of any tech scene happen in person, not in group chats. Because San Diego has a real AI community and it deserves a real party. Because learning works better when there’s snacks and slop involved.

And because — let’s be honest — we’re not building nuclear bombs here. We’re changing the world a different way. Might as well have fun doing it.

100% of proceeds go to the Ansir Innovation Center at the end of the night. Your ticket literally funds the next generation of San Diego makers, builders, and AI weirdos. Thanks for showing up.

See you May 27. Doors open at 5 for setup.