The Top Charities Fund supports the highest-priority funding needs among our top charities.

We find and recommend outstanding giving opportunities and publish our research to help donors give more effectively and with greater confidence.

All donations here support our Top Charities Fund. Donations to the Top Charities Fund are granted on a rolling basis to support cost-effective funding opportunities at our top charities. We use our latest research to grant the funds to the top charity (or charities) where we believe they’ll do the most good.

Learn more and view past grants at https://www.givewell.org/top-charities-fund


Photo caption: At health centers in Sierra Leone supported by Helen Keller Intl, mothers who bring their children in for twice-yearly vitamin A supplemention can also receive comprehensive counseling about birth control options that are available to them free of charge. Combining family planning and children's healthcare services benefits both mother and child. 2019.

Top Charities Fund

We protect farm animals from cruelty, inspire change in the way society views and treats farm animals.

Farm Sanctuary was founded in 1986 to combat the abuses of factory farming, advocate for institutional reforms, and encourage a new awareness and understanding of farm animals and the benefits of cruelty-free, plant-based living. In recent years, science has confirmed the inhumane and destructive impact of animal agriculture — a food system based on interrelated oppression and injustice.

As the founding farm animal Sanctuary in the U.S., Farm Sanctuary has rescued and provided refuge for countless survivors of the animal agriculture system. Today, at Farm Sanctuary’s Los Angeles, CA and Watkins Glen, NY Sanctuaries you will find nearly 1,000 rescued animals—each with an individual story to tell. These survivors are ambassadors, representing the billions of farm animals currently in the system. They, and others like them, have changed the hearts and minds of a generation.

Farm Sanctuary

Delivering unconditional cash directly to the world's poorest households via secure mobile transfers. 

Since 2009, GiveDirectly has delivered more than $580 million in unconditional cash transfers to families in need. These one-time cash transfers allow recipients to invest in what they need most and have been shown to improve their earnings, children’s school attendance, health, nutrition, and mental well-being.
 
GiveDirectly uses government data to target villages where most or all residents are living in extreme poverty, defined by the World Bank as earning under $2.15/day. In-country GiveDirectly staff enroll one member of each household in the entire village to receive a one-time transfer of about $1,000 USD sent in two installments using mobile money. Recipients can then withdraw the mobile funds as cash with local agents and use the funds to invest in what they need – whether it’s on starting a business, education, making their home safer/sturdier, healthcare, or livestock.
 
GiveDirectly uses rigorous experimental research (randomized controlled trials) to measure the impact of their unconditional cash programs and answer public policy questions, generating evidence on key design and implementation questions across varied contexts. You can find over 300 studies on the positive impacts of cash transfers in GiveDirectly’s Cash Research Explorer.

GiveDirectly

A new breed of climate-focused NGO working to build a world that removes more carbon than it emits.

Reducing emissions is not enough.

We envision a world where climate change has been halted and economic prosperity is driven by innovative farmers, foresters, and businesses pulling carbon from the sky.

By partnering with experts and change-makers across industries, we elevate three essential pillars of economic transformation: accelerated research, smart business practices, and effective policies.

With so many solutions at our fingertips and so little time, we’re committed to motivating change widely — and fast. We work alongside people of diverse perspectives and backgrounds to build broad momentum for carbon removal.

Carbon180

Halting rainforest destruction and its impact on climate change by working alongside rainforest communities.

Cool Earth shares the most effective conservation methods around the world and invests in those with the potential for best outcomes for people and rainforest. 

Innovation is the key to scaling up rapid rainforest protection and the lessons learned in one partnership can often be applied to benefit another. 

We work with communities who want to protect their forest. From setting up an in-country team to working directly with communities and local NGOs to develop their capacity, our partnerships are community-led and adaptable to each location.

Cool Earth

To provide sanctuary and exemplary care to chimpanzees in need.

Save the Chimps is one of the largest chimpanzee sanctuaries in the world whose mission is to provide refuge and exemplary care to chimpanzees in need. Save the Chimps offers life-long care for chimpanzees rescued from research laboratories, the pet trade, and entertainment industry. There are currently 1500 more chimpanzees in need of rescue and sanctuary in North America and the donations we receive will help us provide sanctuary to more chimpanzees. We rely 100% on donations to fulfill our mission.

Save the Chimps

Animal Charity Evaluators helps people help the most animals.

Animal Charity Evaluators (ACE) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit registered in the United States with a globally distributed team dedicated to impactful animal advocacy. Our mission is to find and promote the most effective ways to help animals. We work toward that mission by evaluating charities, sharing our findings, awarding grants to organizations and promising projects, and fundraising for our recommended charities and grantees. Our organization opposes all systems of oppression and recognizes that they are connected and mutually reinforcing. Ultimately, our vision is a world in which no individual is given less than full moral consideration on the basis of any morally irrelevant feature of their identity, including species membership.

ACE is proud to be considered a leader in the effective animal advocacy movement. Our research comparing the different approaches to reducing the suffering of animals has led to rigorously reviewing charities that work to end factory farming and create meaningful change for farmed and wild animals. Through our Recommend Charity Fund, we have raised and distributed $8.1M to our effective recommended charities. Our Movement Grants program has awarded $5.3M to promising animal advocacy projects around the globe. Since we began tracking this metric in 2014, we estimate that ACE has helped to influence nearly $60M within the animal advocacy movement.

Thanks for helping ACE help animals!

Animal Charity Evaluators

We search for the charities that save or improve lives the most per dollar.

Our goal is to produce the world's top research on where to give. Free, for everyone.

We recommend a small number of charities that do an incredible amount of good. 

If you would like to donate to our giving funds or individual top charities, please see our projects below. You can donate here or on the Unrestricted Fund page below to make an unrestricted gift to GiveWell to support the full spectrum of our grantmaking and underwrite our ability to continue doing what we do.