How should a new visitor start using the Effective Altruism Forum?

Updated

Start with the Best of the Forum and the EA Handbook, then decide whether you want to read, discuss, or meet people. The EA Forum is a public discussion and research site about the world's most pressing problems, including global health and development, animal welfare, AI safety, and biosecurity. Its homepage is organized around a small set of entry points, so a new visitor can move from orientation to participation without guessing where things are.

First 30 minutes: orient yourself

Use the homepage navigation in roughly this order:

  1. Best of the Forum — the fastest way to see high-quality, representative posts rather than the newest items.
  2. EA Handbook — background reading for the ideas and cause areas the Forum discusses.
  3. Selected posts to help us answer: "How can we do the most good with our resources?" — a curated set of posts framed around the site's central question.
  4. New & upvoted — what the community is currently reading and discussing.

If you only have time for one thing, read the Best of the Forum. It gives you the community's own sense of what is worth reading before you form impressions from random threads.

Choose your path

If you want to… Go to What you get
Read the best material Best of the Forum Curated, high-signal posts
Browse everything All posts The full post stream
Follow a subject Topics Posts grouped by cause area and theme
Find people People directory Profiles of Forum participants
Do something Take action Concrete ways to contribute
Meet people locally Groups directory EA groups you can contact
Attend something Events / Forum events calendar Upcoming events
Understand the norms How to use the Forum Guidance on posting and commenting

Ways to engage

Reading is optional; participation is where the Forum becomes useful to you.

  • Commenting — respond to posts and to other comments. This is the main way discussions develop.
  • Quick takes — short-form posts for observations, links, and questions that don't need a full post.
  • Events — check the Forum events calendar and the Events section for talks and meetups.
  • Groups directory — find a local or cause-specific group if you want to talk to people rather than threads.

Before posting, read How to use the Forum. It sets expectations for tone and quality, and following it is the difference between a productive first post and a ignored one.

Follow the Forum on your own terms

The Forum offers more than the website:

  • RSS — subscribe to the feed if you prefer a reader.
  • EA Forum Podcast — listen to posts rather than read them.
  • Cookie policy / Copyright / Contact us — the footer links for practical and legal details.

Common sticking points

  • Don't start with All posts. It is a firehose; new visitors often bounce off it. Start with Best of the Forum or Topics.
  • Don't assume you need an account to read. The content is browsable; an account matters when you want to comment, post, or use personalized features.
  • Don't skip the Handbook if the terminology is unfamiliar. The Forum assumes some shared vocabulary, and the Handbook fills that gap faster than reading threads.
  • Don't treat one post as the community's view. The Forum hosts disagreement; check comments and related posts before drawing conclusions.

A reasonable first week: read Best of the Forum, skim the EA Handbook, pick one Topic that interests you, and leave one comment or quick take. That gets you from visitor to participant with the least wasted effort.