RenderATL started in 2019 as a software engineering conference with about 300 people in the room. This August it drew more than 6,000 attendees to AmericasMart, filling three floors of the downtown venue. Now founder and CEO Justin Samuels is building it into a year-round organization, anchored by a headquarters in South Downtown.
In a new conversation with Hypepotamus, Samuels laid out how the company plans to keep its momentum going between conferences.
A home base downtown
The biggest local news is the RenderATL headquarters. Samuels announced after this year's events that the space will open once a week for community groups to host meetups and workshops. For Atlanta's tech community, that means a regular downtown spot to gather without having to wait for the next big event.
The headquarters is part of a larger push. RenderATL is growing into a year-round platform that includes Atlanta Tech Week, The Commits awards and the Silicon South Foundation, all working to position Atlanta and the wider South as a leading technology ecosystem.
A conference that does things differently
Anyone who went this year can tell you RenderATL does not feel like a typical trade show. Blazers and business casual were largely absent. On one day many attendees showed up in sports jerseys. Instead of sitting through a single track of panels, people moved across AmericasMart with conversations piped through silent-disco-style headphones.
The two-day event landed in the middle of Atlanta Tech Week and mixed technical talks, workshops, an expo and evening concerts. It brought together 150 speakers and 70 sponsors and partners. Killer Mike delivered a keynote, and the lineup also included Kelsey Hightower, Google's Sarah Drasner and Grammy-winning producer Dallas Austin. The blend has been described as a mix of community, culture and code.
Why Atlanta
Samuels, a Mississippi State University graduate, told Hypepotamus he did not necessarily set out to build what RenderATL has become. What he did see was a gap. He said he was tired of going to the West Coast for large tech events and could not understand why Atlanta, with its strong technical scene and large airport, could not be the hub for a marquee event of its own.
Organizers say the 2025 conference generated more than $55 million in economic impact for the region. Samuels was candid that lining up sponsors was much harder in 2026, and he noted that Atlanta-based companies were largely absent from this year's sponsor list, which leaves room for more hometown support going forward.
What is next
RenderATL will be back August 18 and 19, 2027, according to its website. Between now and then, the weekly community nights at the South Downtown headquarters give local technologists a reason to come downtown well before the next conference.
Source: Hypepotamus, September 28, 2026.
