About

Each competition round takes place online during a designated weekend, with teams choosing any four-hour window across Thursday through Sunday to complete their work. The competition involves two challenges: a Network Security Challenge requiring teams to find and fix vulnerabilities in Windows and Linux operating systems, and a Cisco Networking Challenge combining an online quiz and a virtual networking exercise. No prior cybersecurity knowledge is required — training materials are freely available through the competition platform and Cisco Networking Academy. Teams must include an adult coach and may have up to six student competitors, with a maximum of five competing simultaneously in any given round. Registration opens May 1 and closes October 1 each year.

With over 25,000 teams historically participating, CyberPatriot is less a selective credential than a genuine educational pipeline into cybersecurity — and that's precisely its value. The competition's national scale, its Department of Defense-adjacent credibility through the Air & Space Forces Association, and its explicit focus on defensive security skills make it one of the most recognized pathways into cybersecurity study and careers for high school students. Advancing to the National Finals is a meaningful achievement given the field; simply competing and developing technical skills in network security has documented value for students pursuing computer science or cybersecurity at the college level.

CyberPatriot is the right competition for any team of students interested in cybersecurity — prior experience is genuinely not required — and for serious competitors, advancing through the scored rounds toward the National Finals is one of the clearest signals of technical ability in this field available to a high school student.