Product at Heart 2026

What It Covers

Petra Villa and Theresa Schwartz preview Product at Heart 2026 in Hamburg, Germany. They detail the ninth annual conference format changes, including a single-track program, AI integration across sessions rather than dedicated tracks, roundtable discussions, hands-on workshops, and a new extended product leadership retreat in April.

Key Questions Answered

• •Single-Track Conference Curation: Product at Heart 2026 runs a single-track format for 800 attendees due to venue renovations, requiring more careful speaker selection than previous dual-track events. This eliminates audience choice between parallel sessions, making content curation more challenging as organizers must predict relevant product management topics six months ahead in a rapidly evolving AI landscape.
• •AI Integration Philosophy: The conference avoids creating a separate AI track, instead embedding AI discussions throughout all sessions. This approach treats AI as a standard tool in the product toolkit rather than a specialty topic, reflecting the belief that AI capabilities should be integrated into every product manager's core competencies rather than siloed as an optional specialization.
• •Roundtable Alternative Programming: Theme-based roundtables accommodate 12-20 people and serve as alternative programming to main stage talks. Two formats run simultaneously: speaker-led Q&A sessions immediately following talks, and topic-based discussions hosted by product coaches and consultants. This addresses the missing second track and provides intimate learning opportunities for attendees seeking deeper engagement.
• •Maker Studio Workshop Format: Theresa Schwartz's full-day workshop requires pre-conference homework setting up Claude or Codex, then guides participants through identifying AI-augmentable work tasks, designing workflows using discovery habits and story mapping, and building a functional personal AI workflow deployable immediately after the conference. The hands-on hackathon approach delivers practical implementation skills rather than theoretical knowledge.
• •Extended Leadership Retreat Model: The product leadership event expands from half-day to one-and-a-half days in April, limited to 60 attendees. The format includes speaker sessions, Hamburg harbor excursions, improv workshops, networking dinners, and six ninety-minute mini-workshops offered twice so attendees can select two topics. This addresses the isolation product leaders experience as solo practitioners in their organizations.