Razorpay AI Buildathon 2026: ₹75,000/Month Internship for Students — Everything You Need to Know

Razorpay, one of India's largest fintech companies, has launched the Razorpay AI Buildathon 2026 — a student-only hiring program that skips the traditional resume screen, aptitude test, and group discussion entirely. Instead, you pick an AI track, build something real, show your work, and if it has signal, Razorpay calls you in for a direct panel interview. The selected builders get a 6 or 12 month AI Builder Internship at Razorpay's Bangalore office with a monthly stipend of ₹75,000.

This is one of the most meritocratic internship programs in India right now. Your college name, CGPA, and resume formatting do not matter. What matters is whether you can build a working AI system and defend your architecture decisions in front of a panel.

Here is everything you need to know about the Razorpay AI Buildathon — the tracks, eligibility, stipend, selection process, and tips to stand out.

What Is the Razorpay AI Buildathon?

The Razorpay AI Buildathon is a student-focused hiring program designed to discover and hire the next generation of AI Builder Interns at Razorpay. Unlike traditional internship hiring where applicants submit resumes and wait for shortlisting, the Buildathon flips the process. You apply by building and shipping a real AI project tied to one of five tracks, submitting it as a public GitHub repository along with a 5-minute pitch video and your architecture walkthrough.

Razorpay then reviews your build for signal — not your resume, not your college tier, not your CGPA. If your project demonstrates real capability, you move directly to a technical panel interview. There is no aptitude test, no screening call, and no group discussion anywhere in the process.

The program is led by Razorpay's AI Builders initiative, which was launched after CEO Harshil Mathur put out a call for builders who spend their days working with AI agents, automating workflows, experimenting with Claude Code, MCPs, and pushing the boundaries of what is possible with AI. The response from India's developer community was so strong that Razorpay created a dedicated hiring path for builders who can show their work instead of talking about it on a resume.

Program Overview

Organization: Razorpay Software Private Limited

Program Name: Razorpay AI Buildathon

Role: AI Builder Intern

Monthly Stipend: ₹75,000 per month

Duration: 6 months or 12 months (candidate's choice)

Location: Razorpay Office, Bangalore, Karnataka (In-person, full-time)

Joining Date: From September 2026

Application Deadline: September 5, 2026

Screening Method: No Resume Screening, No Aptitude Test, No Group Discussion

Selection Method: Direct Technical Panel Interview based on Submitted Build

Target Audience: Currently enrolled college students (B.Tech, M.Tech, BCA, MCA, or equivalent)

Application Link: https://razorpay.com/buildathon/

The Five Tracks

Razorpay has structured the Buildathon around five AI tracks. You pick one and build your project within that problem space. You are not expected to solve all of them. The first four tracks map directly to real problems inside Razorpay's payments and business banking product stack, while the fifth track is an open category for any AI-native idea.

Track 01: AI Growth and Agentic Commerce

This track focuses on growing merchant revenue and enabling AI-driven commerce workflows. You are expected to build an agent that grows revenue for a merchant on Razorpay test-mode APIs, or enables an AI buyer to complete a transaction end-to-end.

Possible directions include conversational in-app checkout experiences, agent-readable product catalogs, upsell and cross-sell agents, and campaign orchestrators that use AI to drive growth loops and personalization at scale.

Track 02: AI Risk Manager

This track is about building AI system architectures that detect financial fraud, manage transaction risks, and enforce compliance controls in real time. You would be working on systems that can flag suspicious patterns, score transaction risk, and automate compliance workflows — all critical problems in the payments and fintech space.

Track 03: AI Revenue Recovery

This track focuses on creating intelligent agents and systems designed to identify, mitigate, and recover lost merchant revenue caused by payment failures, customer churn, or checkout drop-offs. If you have thought about how AI can recover failed EMI mandates, reduce involuntary churn, or automatically retry and optimize payment routing, this is the track for you.

Track 04: AI Finance Controller

This track is about automating complex financial management workflows, reconciliation systems, and ledger accounting through intelligent multi-agent automation. You would be building AI systems that can handle end-to-end financial operations — from transaction matching and reconciliation to reporting and anomaly detection.

Track 05: Open Track

The Open Track exists for any significant real-world problem that you want to solve using AI, outside the four defined tracks. Since Razorpay explicitly states that a well-executed Open Track submission will beat a half-built entry in a core track, this is a legitimate path for builders who have a strong idea that does not fit neatly into the first four categories.

How the Selection Process Works

The selection process is short and skips most of the friction you would expect from a large company's hiring funnel. Here is the full sequence.

Step 1: Apply and Pick a Track

Visit https://razorpay.com/buildathon/ and fill out the application form. Choose one of the five tracks based on where your interests and skills align best.

Step 2: Build Something Real

Create a working AI project tied to your chosen track. This is not a slide deck exercise. You are expected to ship functional code that demonstrates real capability. The project should solve a meaningful problem, use AI tools or models appropriately, and run without critical failures.

Step 3: Push to a Public GitHub Repo

Your code needs to be visible and reviewable. Push your project to a public GitHub repository with clear README documentation explaining what it does, how to run it, and what decisions you made during development.

Step 4: Deliver a 5-Minute Pitch Video

Record a concise 5-minute video explaining what you built, why it matters, and what problem it solves. Razorpay is looking for clarity of thought and the ability to communicate technical work simply and effectively.

Step 5: Walk Through Your Architecture

Be prepared to explain your technical decisions — why you chose a particular stack, database, model, or design pattern. Razorpay evaluates builders on how deeply they understand their own architecture, not just what the project does on the surface.

Step 6: Panel Interview

A final conversation with Razorpay's technical panel, digging into both your project and your broader thinking as a builder. Shortlisted builders go straight to this panel — no aptitude test, no group discussion, no screening calls.

What Razorpay Is Evaluating

Based on how Razorpay has described the process, they evaluate candidates on four key parameters rather than academic scores.

Problem Taste: Whether you identified a real-world problem that holds financial or operational significance. Razorpay wants builders who can spot high-signal problems, not just apply AI to random use cases.

Build Quality: The code structure, repository organization, execution stability, and architectural robustness of your project. Clean, well-documented code matters.

AI Judgment: Whether AI tools, LLMs, or agents were applied appropriately instead of being forced into the project unnecessarily. Razorpay wants builders who use AI where it genuinely adds value, not as a buzzword.

Failure Recovery: How you identified system failures at runtime and engineered graceful fallbacks. Real-world AI systems fail, and Razorpay wants to see that you have thought about edge cases and error handling.

Who Should Apply

This program is explicitly for currently enrolled college students. If you are pursuing a B.Tech, M.Tech, BCA, MCA, or an equivalent technical program, you are eligible to apply. The program is specifically designed for students who want to be evaluated on what they build rather than what their resume says.

You should apply if you have already built and shipped small AI, ML, or full-stack projects — even solo weekend builds count. If you are comfortable working with LLM APIs, vector databases, agent frameworks, or automation tools, this is a strong fit. If you can explain your architecture decisions clearly, not just describe what your project does, you will stand out. And if you are open to an in-person internship in Bangalore for 6 to 12 months, the program is ready for you.

The stipend of ₹75,000 per month is significantly higher than most student internships in India, and the 6 or 12 month duration gives you meaningful time to work on real production systems at one of the country's largest fintech companies.

Important Dates

Applications Open: Active now

Application Deadline: September 5, 2026

Build Screening and Shortlisting: Rolling basis through September 2026

Panel Interview Round: Post-shortlisting (exact dates announced to shortlisted applicants)

Internship Commencement: From September 2026

Tips to Stand Out

If you are planning to apply to the Razorpay AI Buildathon, here are some practical tips to improve your chances.

Pick the track where you can build the strongest project, not the one that sounds the most impressive. A fully working, well-documented project in the Open Track will always beat a half-built prototype in a core track. Razorpay has said this explicitly.

Focus on the build, not the pitch deck. Razorpay wants working code, not slides. Make sure your GitHub repo is clean, your README is clear, and someone can clone and run your project without asking you questions.

Explain why you made the choices you made. Architecture walkthrough is a key part of the evaluation. Be ready to justify why you chose a particular model, database, framework, or design pattern. Razorpay cares about your reasoning, not just your output.

Handle failures gracefully. Build error handling and fallback mechanisms into your project from the start. Razorpay specifically evaluates failure recovery, so a project that crashes on bad input will score poorly regardless of how impressive the happy path looks.

Use AI where it makes sense, not everywhere. Razorpay evaluates AI judgment. If you force an LLM into a problem that a simple rule-based system would solve better, you will be marked down. Use AI where it genuinely adds value.

Document everything. Your GitHub repo, your README, your pitch video, and your architecture walkthrough are all part of the evaluation. Treat documentation as a first-class deliverable, not an afterthought.

Why This Matters

The Razorpay AI Buildathon represents a shift in how Indian fintech companies approach student hiring. Instead of filtering thousands of resumes through CGPA cutoffs and college tier lists, Razorpay is letting the work speak for itself. For students who have been building AI projects on the side — experimenting with agents, automating workflows, or prototyping with LLMs — this is one of the clearest paths to a high-paying, meaningful internship at a major Indian tech company.

The program is also a signal of where the industry is heading. Razorpay is not just hiring engineers to write code. They are hiring builders who can identify problems, architect solutions, ship working systems, and communicate their work clearly. These are the skills that matter in the age of AI, and the Buildathon is designed to surface them directly.

How to Apply

Visit the official Razorpay AI Buildathon page at https://razorpay.com/buildathon/, fill out the application form, pick your track, and start building. The deadline is September 5, 2026.

If you get shortlisted, you will receive communication directly from Razorpay. Note that Razorpay only contacts candidates through official Razorpay email addresses ending with @f5.com or auto email notifications from Workday. Be cautious of any communication from unrelated email addresses.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is eligible for the Razorpay AI Buildathon?

Currently enrolled college students pursuing B.Tech, M Tech, BCA, MCA, or equivalent technical programs are eligible to apply.

Is there a resume screening round?

No. There is no resume screening, no aptitude test, and no group discussion. Selection is based entirely on the quality of your build and your performance in the panel interview.

What is the stipend?

₹75,000 per month for the full duration of the internship, whether you choose 6 months or 12 months.

Can I choose between 6 and 12 months?

Yes. You can select either a 6-month or 12-month duration based on your preference and availability.

Do I need a team to apply?

Razorpay's public communication does not specify team size requirements. Check the official application page for the latest details.

What if I do not get shortlisted?

Since screening is based entirely on your build and pitch, unsuccessful applicants still walk away with a shipped project for their portfolio, which is useful for other internship and job applications.

Is the internship in-person or remote?

The internship is in-person at Razorpay's office in Bangalore, Karnataka. You must be available for full-time, on-site work starting September 2026.

What happens after the internship?

The Buildathon is designed as a hiring pipeline for Razorpay's AI Builder Intern roles. Outstanding performers during the internship may receive full-time opportunities, though this is not guaranteed and depends on business needs and individual performance.

Author's Note: This article is based on publicly available information from Razorpay's official Buildathon page and third-party sources as of August 2026. Eligibility criteria, tracks, and process details may change. Always check https://razorpay.com/buildathon/ for the latest and most accurate information before applying.