The 2025 Fediverse Needs Assessment is Open: Have Your Say

Every year, IFTAS asks the people who keep our communities safe to tell us what they need.
The Fediverse Needs Assessment gathers input from moderators, administrators, and community managers across the decentralised social web and beyond.

Whether you run a Mastodon, Pixelfed, Lemmy or Peertube instance, a Nostr relay, a Bluesky community, Matrix or Discord rooms, your experience matters. Any platform, any protocol. Single user service or a million person community. Doesn’t matter. We focus on Fedi, but the more we hear from the more we can help.

Start the survey

Why we do this

IFTAS is not a governing body. We don’t set rules for the Fediverse. What we do is listen, convene, and share: we take the challenges you tell us about, and work with the community to spread best practice, build resources, and advocate for the tools and support you need.

Last year’s survey led directly to:

CSAM detection and reporting guidance
DSA and OSA regulatory compliance guidance
The CARIAD domain observatory
Open-sourcing FediCheck
Translations of the common vocabulary into Chinese, Brazilian Portuguese, and French

These resources were made possible because people like you spoke up.

This year’s focus

Over the coming weeks we’ll be sharing stories and insights on:

Real change from real answers – impact from last year’s data
What it’s like on the front line – the moderator experience, including burnout and wellness
What’s missing, what’s next – the resource and tooling gaps we can address together
It’s not just Mastodon – the diversity of platforms and communities

Each theme is drawn directly from your feedback in 2024, and will help guide how we frame and share the 2025 results.

What we’re asking this year

We want to know:

How your moderation teams are structured,
What resources you have, and what’s missing,
The legal, financial, and mental health pressures you face,
Which tools, training, or guidance would help you most.

Some questions are about your service as a whole, others are about your personal experience. You don’t have to answer everything – every question is optional. Only tell us what you’re comfortable sharing. All data is held in the strictest confidence, and only one person (Jaz-Michael King) ever sees the identifiable data.

Why your response matters

This survey is more than a snapshot, it’s a roadmap. Your answers help us direct funding, development, and advocacy efforts where they will have the most impact, especially for communities facing harassment, resource shortages, and high-risk content.

A small thank-you

Fifty respondents will be selected at random to receive a thank-you for their time valued at $20 USD, with options to receive the funds in a number of currencies and formats.