How to Contribute to the LibreOffice Community

Updated

You can contribute to LibreOffice in seven main areas: Design, Localisation, Marketing, Documentation, Development, Infrastructure, and Quality Assurance. The project is open source and explicitly welcomes new contributors, so no prior status is required — but if you are starting out, the site recommends scheduling an orienting interview with TDF mentor Ilmari Lauhakangas before you begin.

The seven contribution areas

The LibreOffice community page lists these paths, each with its own skills and entry point:

Area What it covers
Design Visual and interaction design work for the suite
Localisation Translating and maintaining the software in the world's languages
Marketing Promoting LibreOffice and reaching new users
Documentation Writing and maintaining guides and help content
Development Writing and improving the source code
Infrastructure Keeping the project's servers and tooling running
Quality Assurance Testing the software and reporting or verifying bugs

Pick the one that matches what you already do. If you write, Documentation or Marketing is the shortest path in. If you translate, Localisation. If you code, Development or Infrastructure. If you are unsure, QA is often the easiest place to start because it needs users rather than specialists.

Start with the orienting interview

The site's own recommendation for newcomers is to schedule an orienting interview with TDF mentor Ilmari Lauhakangas before contributing. This is the step most people skip, and skipping it is the most common reason a first contribution stalls — you end up in the wrong channel, working on something already handled, or unsure how to submit.

Treat the interview as a routing step: it tells you which area fits you and who to talk to next.

Why the project is set up this way

LibreOffice is free and open source software, which means anyone can study how it works and add improvements. That openness is also why contribution is organised into named areas with mentors: the software is tested and used daily by a large user community, and changes are reviewed rather than merged blindly. The community describes itself as made up of hundreds of contributors around the world, and it encourages translation, documentation, and maintenance in all of the world's languages.

Common sticking points

  • Skipping the mentor interview. The site recommends it for a reason; it prevents wasted effort.
  • Choosing an area by prestige rather than skill. Development gets the most attention, but Documentation, Localisation, and QA absorb newcomers faster.
  • Expecting instant merge. Contributions go through community review, so plan for feedback rounds.
  • Assuming you need to be a programmer. Five of the seven areas — Design, Localisation, Marketing, Documentation, and QA — do not require writing code.

What to do next

  1. Go to the LibreOffice community page and read the seven area descriptions.
  2. Decide which area matches your existing skills.
  3. Schedule the orienting interview with the TDF mentor before starting work.
  4. Begin with a small, well-scoped task in that area rather than a large one.

The suite itself — Writer, Calc, Impress, Draw, Base, and Math — is the product these contributions improve, and the current release noted on the site is LibreOffice 26.8.