California · Nonprofit
THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB
THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB (California) receives grants from 125 organizations whose IRS filings report $28,398,898 to it, the largest being MUSK FOUNDATION ($9,290,000). 37 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2024
- $22M
- Funders on record
- 125
- Grants received
- $28M
- Net assets
- $18M
What The Hack Foundation D/B/A Hack Club does
Mission
The hack foundation, d.b.a. Hack club (hack club or organization) is a not-for profit organization formed in 2016 to help create the highly technical problem solvers of tomorrow by engaging teenage programmers in a worldwide network of peers. Through building open source projects they're proud of, forming life-long friendships, and gaining life skills through going on incredible adventures like hackathons. Hack club receives support and revenue primarily from donations. Hack club's fiscal sponsorship activities expanded to cover a broader array of charitable and educational activities in 2023. Hack club applies the same principles and procedures it developed as a sponsor to coding clubs to have a broader impact on a greater array of issue areas. Hack club retains ultimate supervisory authority over its projects and requires its projects to operate in a manner consistent with the requirements of 501(c)(3), while empowering them to use their initiative and energy to advance their mission
As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.
Programs
Hack club. Total revenue: 5,238,425. Total expenses: 3,792,052 hack club is the world's largest charity for teenagers interested in computers and electronics. We serve tens of thousands of high schoolers each year through educational competitions and in-person hackathons, we give over 1m each year to teenagers in grants and components for their projects, and more. We help teenagers learn technical skills to thrive in the 21st century, form lifelong friendships, and build life skills through going on incredible adventures like hackathons. Almost all of our staff and operations are within hack club.
$3,792,052 spent28% of program spendingFiscally sponsored projects. Total revenue: 16,085,394. Total expenses: 9,545,562. Note: this is the sum total of all funds raised and spent across all fiscal sponsees. This is not revenue or expenses of hack club. Started in 2018, the hack foundation started offering fiscal sponsorship services to nonprofit charitable projects - many of which are led by high schoolers. Today we sponsor a wide variety of for-good nonprofit charitable projects through our in-house developed financial transparency software to help grassroots groups do more with less. Hcb by hack club.
$9,545,562 spent$812,269 earned by the program72% of program spending
The 2 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $13,337,614.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2023 to 2024, from $10M to $19M (+82%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2018 0% · 2019 0% · 2024 1%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
95% of THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB’s revenue is contributions — more reliant on donations than three-quarters of its peers (52% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 1 of the last 8 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Who funds it, year by year
2018 → 2023: the base broadened from 5 funders to 34 funders, grant income rose $48k → $7.5M.
29 of 125 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 35% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 125 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 33% of grant income, and it takes 4 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 4 funders to its left
44% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2018 52% · 2019 72% · 2020 45% · 2021 57% · 2022 56% · 2023 54% — broadly stable.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
35% of THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 30% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB draws 74% of its grant income from funders outside California, across 20 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $10.0M arriving through sponsors registered in 16 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB runs a healthier operating margin than three-quarters of the 149 science & tech nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 149 science & tech nonprofits $10M–$100M, FY2024
Organizations like THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In California
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
94% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
77%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB?
- THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB (California) receives grants from 125 organizations whose IRS filings report $28,398,898 to it, the largest being MUSK FOUNDATION ($9,290,000). 37 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB have?
- IRS filings report 125 organizations giving $28,398,898 in grants to THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB, 37 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB?
- MUSK FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $9,290,000 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like THE HACK FOUNDATION D/B/A HACK CLUB find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in California. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
Play a game about who funds Hack Foundation D/B/A Hack Club →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2024 (financials across 2017–2024), and the filings of 125 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing