Methodology
How we work
When you donate to the best charities, you can make an amazing difference. Many of these organizations are more than 100x as effective as the average organization.
Our aim is to make it as easy as possible for you to donate effectively. But what does it mean to donate effectively? Donating effectively means that you achieve as much good as possible with your donation. This is especially successful if you:
- Find a promising subject area that you would like to support.
- Choose an excellent charity or fund that works in this field.
Find promising subject areas
We all have limited resources and cannot support every worthwhile cause with our donation. You therefore have to decide what you use your funds for. Every decision in favor of one area is therefore also a decision against other areas.
So if you want to do as much good as possible, you need to make sure that you focus on the most important problems or issues. We use four factors to select the areas in which we recommend charities at Effektiv Spenden:
- Size: Are a particularly large number of people or other living beings significantly affected by this problem?
- Neglect: Are comparatively few donations being used to solve the problem?
- Solubility: Can we demonstrably improve the situation with additional (donated) funds?
- Urgency: Does inaction significantly exacerbate the problem over time or are irreversible tipping points even exceeded?
You can generally maximize your impact by targeting your donations to issues that are particularly large, neglected, solvable and urgent. On this basis, we currently recommend charities in the areas of (i) Fighting Poverty, (ii) Mitigating Climate Change, (iii) Improving Animal Welfare, (iv) Safeguarding the Future, and (v) Defending Democracy.
Select an award-winning charity
In the next step, we look for the best charities within these subject areas. Based on current research findings, including those of Nobel Prize winners, we present the world’s most promising charities. Our recommendations are based on four basic principles. The organizations we recommend are
- Transparent: The charities provide exemplary accountability.
- Effective:: Their effectiveness has been proven through rigorous scientific research and evaluation.
- Efficient: The effect achieved is in excellent proportion to the costs incurred.
- Scalable: The charities can use additional funds effectively and promptly.
Our recommendations also take other factors into account. And we try to limit ourselves to a maximum of 3-5 recommendations per subject area so that the selection does not become too confusing.
In any case, if you donate to one of the organizations presented here, you are automatically donating to one of the most effective organizations in its field.
Our partners
Finding the best aid organizations is not that easy. That’s why we work closely with experts who have been conducting extensive and in-depth research for many years. These experts then publish these analyses in full online. In doing so, they pursue the same goal as we do at Effektiv Spenden: to find out as precisely as possible how much good a charity’s program does per euro invested.
Fighting Poverty
In the area Fighting Poverty we work closely with GiveWell the world’s leading organization for evaluating the effectiveness of aid organizations. GiveWell examines where donations per euro have the greatest impact, for example by saving or significantly improving lives.
The institute was founded in 2007 and now invests more than 60,000 hours a year in research work. On this basis GiveWell has already provided more than 2 billion euros for particularly effective projects. This has saved over 400,000 lives.
Our Giving Fund: Fighting Poverty is based on the “All Grants Fund by GiveWell. Donors can use these to ensure that they are always supporting the most effective aid projects at any given time.
For major donors, we also offer the opportunity to donate in cooperation with our partner, Charity Entrepreneurshipin selected non-profit start-ups in the area of Fighting Poverty to “invest”.
Mitigating Climate Change
In the area Mitigating Climate Change is Founders Pledge. our most important partner. Over 2,000 founders have pledged to donate a portion of their proceeds in the event of a company sale. In this case, the Founders Pledge. Research Team, they learn how they can also achieve the maximum (social) return on their philanthropic commitment.
Since its foundation Founders Pledge. has already donated more than 1.5 billion US dollars to aid organizations. All research reports and donation recommendations are published transparently on the Founders Pledge.-website.
Our Giving Fund: Mitigating Climate Change is based on the Founders Pledge Climate Fund. Donors can use these to ensure that they are always supporting the most effective aid organizations.
With regard to the recommendation of individual climate protection organizations, we also work with Giving Green an independent research group that helps private individuals and companies to find particularly effective climate protection organizations.
Improving Animal Welfare
In the area Improving Animal Welfare we work with several independent organizations that evaluate animal welfare projects.
Our Giving Fund: Improving Animal Welfare is based on the recommendations of the EA Animal Welfare Fundwhich has awarded over 20 million euros to particularly effective animal welfare organizations since 2017.
For the recommendation of individual organizations, we also cooperate with Animal Charity Evaluators,, Open Philanthropy and Founders Pledge..
Major donors can also work together with our partner Charity Entrepreneurship specifically “invest” in innovative non-profit start-ups in the field of animal welfare.
Safeguarding the future and controlling AI
In the area Safeguarding the Future we work particularly closely with Longview Philanthropy for our work.
Longview Philanthropy is a philanthropy consultancy that helps people to do as much good as possible with their donations, explicitly taking into account the interests of future generations.
Our Giving Fund: Safeguarding the Future is based on the Emerging Challenges Fund by Longview Philanthropy.
Also with our Giving Fund: Ensuring Safe AI. we follow the recommendations of Longview Philanthropy.
Other organizations that promote effective giving
In addition to the reviewers listed above, we use the knowledge of other internationally active organizations and foundations that also evaluate their funding projects with great conscientiousness and make their results available to us. Among others:
- Focus Philanthropy
- Giving What We Can
- Happier Lives Institute
- Rethink Priorities
- The Life You Can Save
In addition, there is a whole ecosystem of organizations like us that enable people to donate effectively. We are in regular contact with these organizations to support each other and learn from each other:
- Australia Effective Altruism Australia
- Belgium: Effectief Geven
- Denmark: Giv effective
- Estonia: Anneta Targalt
- France: Mieux Donner
- Italy: Benefficiency
- Netherlands: Doneer Effectief
- Norway: Gi Effective
- Sweden: Effective
- Spain: Ayuda Efectiva
- USA/United Kingdom: Giving What We Can
Subscribe to our newsletter
News about us and our donation projects. Cancel at any time.
Individual donation advice
Do you have any questions about our recommendations? Or are you planning such a large donation that you would like to have a personal discussion beforehand? Or would you like to work with us to develop a multi-year philanthropic strategy?
