The Hyperloop Pod Competition was an annual competition sponsored by SpaceX from 2015 to 2019 in which a number of student and non-student teams participated to design—and for some teams, build—a subscale prototype transport vehicle in order to demonstrate technical feasibility of various aspects of the Hyperloop concept. The competitions were open to participants globally, although all competitions and judging occurred in the United States of America.
A competition in 2020 on a longer track was envisioned; however, in the event, no longer track was built and the pod-racing competition was superseded in 2021 by a tunnel-boring competition, with the aim for teams to rapidly and accurately build a tunnel long and wide.
Overview There were three judging phases in the 2015–2017 competition: a design competition that was held in January 2016, and two on-track competitions—27–29 January 2017, and, Competition Weekend II, 25–27 August 2017. The on-track portion of the competition is run on the SpaceX Hyperloop test track—or Hypertube—a mile-long, partial-vacuum, diameter steel tube purpose-built in Hawthorne, California, for the competition.
Thirty of the 115 teams that submitted designs in January 2016 were selected to build hardware to compete on a sponsored Hyperloop test track in January 2017. There were more than 1,000 applicants at earlier stages of the competition. The first competition completed in January 2017, with 27 teams from around the world participating. Delft Hyperloop from the Technical University of Delft won the best design prize. WARR Hyperloop, from the Technical University of Munich, won fastest speed prize. In April 2017, 24 teams were selected to compete in Competition Weekend II held in August; WARR Hyperloop won top honors with a top speed in the mile-long test track.
In July 2018, 18 teams competed in the main competition with top speed as the only judged criterion; two additional teams competed in the levitation sub-competition. WARR Hyperloop again won top honors in the main competition, beating its own record with a run; UCSB Hyperloop was the only team to be able to compete in the levitation sub-competition, thus automatically winning.
It was announced during Competition III that Competition IV was confirmed to take place in the northern hemisphere summer of 2019. Technical University of Munich won the competition, and the 2020 Hyperloop competition was announced.
Results +YearFirstTop speed (km/h)SecondTop speed (km/h)ThirdTop speed (km/h)Source2016 JanuaryMakers UPV (Politechnical University of Valencia UPV) -Nova Hyperloop Team, University of CairoAuburn University Hyperloop Team, Auburn University2017 JanuaryTechnical University of Delft (Delft Hyperloop)93 - - - -2017 AugustTechnical University of Munich (WARR Hyperloop)323.5Northeastern University; Memorial University of Newfoundland & Labrador (Paradigm Hyperloop)101.4ETH Zurich (Swissloop)40.232018Technical University of Munich (WARR Hyperloop)457TU Delft (Delft Hyperloop )141.6École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFLoop)83.72019Technical University of Munich (TUM Hyperloop)463.5ETH Zurich (Swissloop)257.5École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFLoop)238.13
History The outline of the original Hyperloop concept was made public in August 2013 by the release of a preliminary—or alpha level—design document by Elon Musk, with substantial design assistance from an informal group of engineers at both Tesla Motors and SpaceX who worked on the conceptual foundation and modelling of Hyperloop. The preliminary design called for a steel tube, operating in partial vacuum (nearly airless), utilizing pressurized vehicle "pods" to carry passengers or cargo that would ride on an air cushion driven by linear induction motors and air compressors. The alpha design included a notional route running from the Los Angeles region to the San Francisco Bay Area, paralleling the Interstate 5 corridor for most of its length, so that preliminary economic analysis might be done on the concept. Responses to the design paper release included: "a flash of brilliance" and "hypercool" to "nothing new here" to "hype", "another science-fiction dream," and "completely impractical."
Within days of the 2013 announcement, discussions concluded that building a successful Hyperloop subscale demonstration project could reduce the political impediments while improving cost estimates; Musk suggested that he could choose to become personally involved in building a demonstration prototype of the Hyperloop concept, including funding the development effort.
On 15 June 2015, SpaceX announced that they would sponsor a Hyperloop pod design competition, and would build a subscale test track near SpaceX's headquarters in Hawthorne, California, for the competitive event. The competition could be held as early as June 2016. SpaceX stated in their announcement, "Neither SpaceX nor Elon Musk is affiliated with any Hyperloop companies. While we are not developing a commercial Hyperloop ourselves, we are interested in helping to accelerate development of a functional Hyperloop prototype." More than 700 teams had submitted preliminary applications by July.
Detailed competition rules were released for the first competition in August 2015, with revisions in October. Formal Intent to Compete submissions were due 15 September 2015 with SpaceX intending to release the detailed tube and technical specification by October 2015 but became available somewhat later. A preliminary design briefing was held in November 2015, and , Final Design Packages were due on 13 January 2016. A Design Weekend was held at Texas A&M University on 29–30 January 2016 for all invited entrants. The selected pods will compete at the SpaceX Hyperloop Test Track in January 2017.
More than 120 student engineering teams were selected from the preliminary design briefing presentations in November to submit final design packages in January 2016. The designs were released to public view prior to the end of January 2016, and selected teams were invited to build hardware and compete in time trials, planned for mid-2016 at the time.
SpaceX announced in January 2016 that they had engaged a Los Angeles-based, Fortune-500, engineering design and construction firm AECOM, to build the Hyperloop Test Track. Triumph Group was also recognized as a major contributor to the construction efforts.
At a 29–30 January 2016 meeting at Texas A&M University, hosted by the College of Engineering, the designs from the approximately 120 worldwide teams were reviewed and judged. 30 teams were selected to go forward and build prototype Hyperloop pods for the competition later in the year.
On 30 January 2016, Musk announced that, due to the level of sophistication of the pod designs as well as design issues with economical design approaches to building the test track, "given this level of enthusiasm, there is no question we are going to have another Hyperloop competition." Further information came in August 2016: the team sign-up deadline would be 30 September 2016 to compete in the second pod competition sometime in 2017.
In the event, the mid-2016 competition schedule was delayed to January 2017. TechCrunch published a photograph of the pod competition test track still under construction in September 2016. Competition teams visited the track for fit checks and vacuum/track tests during the first week of November, and a video was released.
The on-track portion of the competition finally got underway on 27 January 2017 with 27 teams competing. WARR Hyperloop, from the Technical University of Munich won top honors.
In April 2017, 24 teams were selected to compete in Competition Weekend II. Held in August 2017, WARR Hyperloop won top honors once again, this time with a top speed in the mile-long test track.
In September 2017, SpaceX announced that they would sponsor another competition in the third quarter of 2018. As with the Competition Weekend II in 2017, only student teams may enter the competition, and the "competition will be judged solely on one criteria: [sic] maximum speed with successful deceleration (i.e. without crashing)." Unlike the two test track competitions in 2017 however, all pods must be self-propelled. SpaceX will not provide an external pusher-vehicle as they did provide to facilitate student team pod testing in both the January and August 2017 competitions. Ultra-small pods will not be allowed this time, with minimum pod length set at . There will be an additional sub-competition with up to three qualifying teams allowed to take part in a Levitation Sub-Competition that will require non-wheeled pod levitation and will be tested on an external (non-vacuum) test track. The pods will need to translate at least down the track, stop, reverse, and translate back to the original position, all while levitating the entire duration. Fastest full cycle wins the levitation sub-competition. The 2018 competition will take place 22 July 2018.
, Steve Davis—who joined SpaceX as employee no. 9 in 2003, and was then project leader for The Boring Company—had been the operations manager for the Hyperloop Pod Competition since inception.
The fourth year of competition was announced for the northern hemisphere summer of 2019, and the event was run 21 July 2019. The team from the Technical University of Munich—"Team TUM", formerly named "WARR Hyperloop"—again achieved the highest speed on the track at . Although only slightly faster than the previous year, two other teams were able to achieve high-speed runs for the first time. A total of 21 teams competed with some 700 individuals involved from the teams. Four of the teams were able to qualify for track runs.
Following the July 2019 competition, Musk announced that the 2020 competition will be run on a much longer——track that will include a curve, ten times as long as the 1 km straight track used in the first several years of the annual competition.
By November 2022, the prototype Hyperloop tunnel built for the Hyperloop pod competition in Hawthorne had been disassembled and removed.
Technical overview
Each competition has taken place on a , test track built in southern California. Test pods may not carry any human or animal, and are to be used solely to develop new technologies and subsystems for effecting higher-velocity tube transport systems. The track will facilitate pod test runs where each pod is accelerated, achieves a top measured speed that is reported in real-time, and then decelerates by braking, ostensibly before the end of the test track. There will be a crash pit after the end of the track to absorb the energy of any test pods that fail to come to a stop in the test track tube.
Test track
The SpaceX Hyperloop test track — or Hypertube — was designed in 2015 and was constructed in 2016, reaching its full length of one mile by October 2016. The test track itself is also a prototype, where SpaceX anticipates learning from the design, build process and evaluates how to apply automated construction techniques to future Hyperloop tracks.
The design of the pod test track varies significantly from the Hyperloop tube design shown in the initial alpha-level Hyperloop design concept document released in 2013. The Hypertube test track is designed to enable competitors who implement a wide array of designs and build pods that will test a variety of subsystem technologies that are important to new vehicle transport systems. This will include Hyperloop-specific pods—with air-bearing suspension and low-pressure compressor designs—as well as wheeled vehicle and magnetic levitation rail designs that will support a wide array of vehicle technologies to be tested. Some pods are expected to test only particular subsystems rather than a full Hyperloop-capable pod vehicle design; as well, many pods will have no on-pod compressor to prevent the high-speed choked-flow problem, very unlike the Hyperloop alpha design.