IBM Call for Code Global Challenge Grant is an annual competition from IBM that funds developers and innovators building AI-powered solutions to the world's most urgent social and humanitarian challenges. Launched in 2018 in partnership with the United Nations Human Rights Office, the initiative invites participants from 190+ countries to compete across qualifying hackathons throughout the year.

Focus areas include climate resilience, public health, justice, and sustainable development. Awards range from $5,000 to $50,000. Open to individual developers, data scientists, and teams worldwide with no geographic restriction.

Call For Code AI | Calling All Developers [WHERE DEVELOPERS SOLVE THE WORLD'S GREATEST CHALLENGES WiTH TRUSTED AI ] The most urgent problems on earth need the most skilled people on earth. Call for Code was built on that belief.

Launched in 2018 at VivaTech in Paris — on a global stage that included President Emmanuel Macron and IBM’s CEO — the initiative united IBM as Founding Partner, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UN Human Rights) as Global Impact Partner, and The Linux Foundation as Program Affiliate. That partnership with UN Human Rights brought something rare to the platform.

As the United Nations entity responsible for advancing and protecting human rights across all 193 Member States, it gave Call for Code direct alignment with global policy frameworks and the institutional reach to position solutions for adoption by governments and communities worldwide — not just to build them, but to deploy them.

"Over eight years, Call for Code became the world's largest and longest-running mobilization of developers, innovators, and problem solvers for social good — more than one million people across 190+ countries, building 50,000+ applications addressing climate resilience, disaster response, public health, sustainability, and human rights.

The strongest solutions were recognized at the United Nations, deployed in real communities, and carried forward by the world's leading institutions." This is not a concept. It is a proven global system.

Project OWL restored emergency communications in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria. Prometeo put AI-powered health monitoring on firefighters battling wildfires in Spain. These are not isolated wins.

They are deployed technologies, open-sourced through the Linux Foundation, serving communities around the world — proof that this platform was built not just to surface ideas, but to see them through. Now the question has changed. The challenge facing the world is no longer whether technology can solve hard problems.

It is whether the most powerful technology ever built — artificial intelligence — can be governed well enough to be trusted at the scale it is already being deployed. Call for Code AI is the evolution of that foundation, built for that question. Accountability is not the ceiling on AI ambition.

It is the foundation that makes global deployment possible. Artificial intelligence is already embedded in the systems that shape daily life — healthcare decisions, financial access, climate modeling, emergency response, public services. It influences who receives a diagnosis, who qualifies for a loan, how resources are distributed in a crisis.

The question is no longer what AI can do. The question is whether the systems making those decisions can be tested, trusted, and held to account. Call for Code AI operates as a neutral proving ground for frontier AI systems — evaluating performance, safety, scalability, and alignment with human-rights-centered standards.

Not a hackathon. Not a showcase. Structured infrastructure for responsible AI deployment at global scale.

Open-source stewardship through The Linux Foundation Formal collaboration with United Nations Human Rights embedding global standards Real-world deployment pathways beyond prototype This is what happens when you take developers seriously. The infrastructure is in place. The institutional relationships are established.

The track record is documented across eight years and every major sector. Now the challenge is larger than any that came before it — and Call for Code AI is built to meet it. Now the challenge is larger than any that came before it — ad Call for CodI is built to meet it.

The Call for Code AI Global Challenge mobilizes developers, enterprises, universities, and global institutions to build AI solutions designed from the outset for real-world deployment — not proof-of-concept, but production. The challenge spans climate resilience, public health, justice, and sustainable development.

Solutions are developed in the open, validated through institutional frameworks, and the strongest are elevated to a global stage: recognized by the United Nations, amplified by industry and cultural leaders, and supported toward actual deployment in communities and institutions worldwide. This is what distinguishes the platform — not only the ability to surface breakthrough ideas, but the infrastructure to move them forward.

Alongside the flagship Global Challenge, Spot Challenges enable rapid mobilization around urgent issues as they emerge, operating within the same governance framework so that speed and accountability are never in conflict. AI is advancing faster than the regulatory frameworks designed to govern it.

The platforms capable of validating and deploying trusted AI systems will have an outsized role in shaping how this technology develops — and who it serves. Call for Code AI is built to be one of them. “Call for Code was built through extraordinary collaboration.

IBM, United Nations Human Rights, and The Linux Foundation joined together to establish a global platform where developers could apply their skills to the world’s most pressing challenges — and over eight years, that platform grew into the largest developer mobilization of its kind. What made it work was not technology alone.

It was the alignment of innovation with institutions, culture, and a shared conviction that developers are among the most powerful agents of change in the world. Today, as artificial intelligence becomes embedded in the systems that govern our societies — in healthcare, justice, finance, and public infrastructure — the responsibility to build technology that serves humanity has never been greater.

And the cost of getting it wrong has never been higher. Call for Code AI is the next evolution of that mission. Because the developers who build the future should also be the ones who hold it accountable.

” — David Clark, Founder & CEO Call for Code AI is global infrastructure for turning innovation into action. It connects developers, enterprises, and institutions with the frameworks and pathways required to move ideas from concept to real-world deployment — ensuring that the most promising solutions don't just get built, they get used. AI will reshape every sector of society.

Its impact depends entirely on how it is directed. Call for Code AI channels that power toward public good — aligning technical innovation with accountability, and connecting builders to real-world needs. This is where capability meets responsibility.

The next phase is already in motion. A new Global Challenge and a series of Spot Challenges will open in 2026 — designed to mobilize the developer community around the most urgent AI problems of our time, and carry the strongest solutions toward real-world deployment. Details for the first Spot Challenge will be announced on May 1, 2026.

Mobilizing the world’s developers and institutions to operationalize trusted AI at scale.