What is FIRST Tech Challenge?

FIRST Tech Challenge is a robotics competition for students roughly aged 12–18. Your team designs, builds, and programs a robot to play a game that changes every year, and then competes against other teams at events.

That is the short version. Here is what it actually looks like on the day.

The field and the match

Matches are played on a 12 ft × 12 ft field surrounded by a low wall. Four robots are on the field at once, split into two alliances of two robots each — the red alliance and the blue alliance.

You do not choose your alliance partner during the qualification rounds. The event schedule pairs you with a different team almost every match, which means:

• You will play with a team one match and against them the next.
• Your ranking depends partly on teams you did not pick. Everyone is in the same boat.
• Being easy to work with genuinely matters. Teams remember who communicated well.

A match runs two minutes thirty seconds, split into two periods.

Autonomous (first 30 seconds)

Nobody touches the controllers. The robot runs pre-written code. Points scored in autonomous are usually worth more than the same action in the driver-controlled period, because it is harder.

Most rookie teams write an autonomous that does one simple thing reliably — drive forward and park in a scoring zone — and that is genuinely fine. A reliable 10 points beats an ambitious routine that works one match in four.

Driver-controlled (remaining 2 minutes)

Two students per team operate the robot: a driver and typically an operator who runs the mechanisms. The last 30 seconds is usually called the endgame and contains higher-value scoring tasks — often something like climbing, hanging, or a final scoring rush, depending on the season's game.

The robot

Every season publishes a Game Manual in two parts. Part 1 covers the rules that stay broadly similar year to year; Part 2 covers this season's specific game. The constraints that matter most on day one:

Starting size

Your robot must fit inside an 18-inch cube at the start of a match. It can expand afterwards, within the season's expansion rules.

Control system

You must use the legal FTC control system — in practice, a REV Control Hub (or a phone-based Robot Controller on older setups) with legal motors, servos, and sensors.

Materials

Most raw materials are legal. Most pre-built mechanisms are not. The manual lists exactly which commercial parts are allowed.

How an event runs

A typical league meet or qualifier follows the same shape:

1. Load in and inspection. Your robot is checked against the size, weight, and legality rules. You cannot compete until you pass.
2. Practice matches, if the event offers them.
3. Qualification matches. Usually five or six per team, with randomised alliance partners. You earn ranking points from these.
4. Alliance selection. The top-ranked teams pick partners to form playoff alliances.
5. Playoffs. Elimination rounds to decide the event winner.
6. Awards. Judged awards are announced — and these matter as much as winning.

Judged awards are half the competition

This surprises most rookies. A large share of advancement to higher-level events comes through judged awards, not match record. Judges interview your team, read your Engineering Portfolio, and evaluate things like your design process, your outreach, and your team's story.

The Inspire Award is the top award at an event and typically carries the strongest advancement. It is given to the team that best embodies the whole programme — robot, portfolio, outreach, and interview — not the team that scored the most points.

We cover portfolios, judging, and outreach in detail later in this track.

Check yourself

Your alliance partner in a qualification match is...

• AA team you choose before the event
• BAssigned by the event schedule, and changes nearly every match
• CAlways the team ranked directly below you
• DYour own team's second robot

What to do next

You now know the shape of the thing. The next lesson lays out the season timeline so you know what is due when — this is where rookie teams most often get caught out.