SideQuest

SideQuest turns spare time into real-world micro-experiences. Tell us how much time you have, and we route you to the best nearby place for your vibe. No planning. No scrolling. Just go.

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Inspiration

As newly graduated young adults, we felt the growing absence of third places, spaces outside of work and home where people can casually gather, explore, and connect. With limited free time and constant doomscrolling, even short breaks in our day felt unintentional and draining. We wanted a way to help people reclaim those small pockets of time and turn them into meaningful, real-world experiences. SideQuest was inspired by the desire to reduce passive scrolling, restore a sense of control over our schedules, and make it easier to discover nearby places that align with our interests, habits, and daily rhythms.

What It Does

SideQuest is a time- and location-aware action router for newly graduated young adults. When a user has a short window of free time, especially in a new or unfamiliar city, it instantly recommends a nearby third place or micro-activity that fits their schedule, travel constraints, and personal vibe. By using location, availability, and personalized preferences, SideQuest transforms idle time into intentional adventures, encouraging exploration, conversation, and offline connection.

Challenges We Ran Into

  • Syncing frontend and backend without relying fully on Docker early on
  • Building a meaningful machine learning loop without real training data
  • Coordinating multiple services under tight hackathon time constraints
  • Ensuring reliable communication between backend APIs and the ML service

Accomplishments We’re Proud Of

  • Successfully implementing a self-learning machine learning loop
  • Shipping a multi-service, full-stack product in a limited timeframe
  • Learning how to collaborate effectively under pressure as a team

What We Learned

  • How to design and implement machine learning feedback loops
  • The importance of clear team roles and communication
  • Practical challenges of syncing frontend and backend systems
  • The limitations and tradeoffs of building with synthetic data

What’s Next for SideQuest

Next, we want to expand SideQuest beyond solo exploration by introducing social features, shared quests, safety-aware recommendations, and community-driven discovery. We also plan to incorporate weather-based logic more deeply and add a lightweight gamification system with points, gems, or quest coins to reward exploration and consistency.

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