Ripple

Sydney volunteer recruitment, without the admin drag

Your next reliable volunteer is already looking for you.

Ripple is Sydney's volunteer platform, built for organisations that are done recruiting into the void and ready for a community that actually shows up.

Post your first eventSee how it works

Trusted by community groups, nonprofits, and charities across Sydney.

Three people sitting arm in arm at dusk, looking out over a harbour
A group of smiling children pointing towards the camera

This week on Ripple

Nearby

volunteers filtered by suburb, cause, and availability

One form

to publish a listing with sessions, capacity, and a brief

1

dashboard for sign-ups, reminders, and check-in

Roster confidence, finally

Volunteers arrive briefed, reminded, and checked in from the same flow.

How it works

From listing to fully rostered in minutes.

01

Post your opportunity

Create a detailed listing in one pass. Set your cause, location, date, shift times, capacity, and a full volunteer brief so everyone arrives prepared.

02

Get found by the right people

Ripple surfaces your listing to volunteers filtered by location, cause, and availability. You're not hoping someone stumbles across your post. You're being discovered by people already looking.

03

Manage your roster without the chaos

See who's signed up, track capacity in real time, and communicate with your volunteer group directly through the app. Automated reminders go out before your event without you lifting a finger.

04

Build a following, not just a one-off

Volunteers can follow your organisation and receive push notifications when you post new events. Over time you build a loyal base of people who come back because they want to, not because you remembered to email them.

05

See what happened

Your dashboard tracks total events, unique volunteers, hours contributed, and followers, each against this month. A complete attendance record sits behind every event.

What you get

Everything Ripple does for organisers today.

Everything below works right now. Anything still to come sits in its own block at the end.

Listing an opportunity

  • Set your cause, location, shift sessions, and capacity
  • Save a draft, then schedule it to publish when you choose
  • Bulk-upload a whole calendar of events from a spreadsheet
  • Or send sign-ups straight to your own registration system

Handling sign-ups

  • Approve each applicant, or let them join instantly
  • Build your own application form, autofilled for returning volunteers
  • A waitlist once you are full, so the interest is not lost

Running the day

  • Automatic reminders 24 hours before and the morning of
  • Check volunteers in by QR code, short code, or by hand
  • Message the whole group, or any one volunteer
  • Schedule changes and cancellations notify everyone signed up

Building a following

  • Followers get a push notification the moment you post
  • Run a community with its own feed and members
  • A public organisation page anyone can visit
  • Accept one-off and recurring donations

Seeing what happened

  • Events, unique volunteers, hours contributed, and followers, each against this month
  • A complete attendance record for every event and every volunteer
  • Every applicant’s answers kept against their application

Keeping everyone safe

  • Every organisation is verified before it can list a shift
  • Block anyone, at any time
  • Report content or behaviour, and we action it within 24 hours
  • Published community standards, with a moderation team behind them

Coming up

What we are building next.

Not available yet. Here so you can plan around it.

  • Recurring shifts, and a programme saved as a reusable template
  • Volunteers signing up for individual shifts rather than whole events
  • Repeat-volunteer rate, and how your numbers move over time
  • Grant-ready and board-ready exports of your volunteering data

Scheduling and rosters

Running the day itself.

How do you create an online volunteer sign-up?

On Ripple, you create a listing with shift times, capacity, and a direct sign-up link that volunteers can share. It is one form, and your event goes live the moment you publish it.

What is the best volunteer scheduling software?

The best volunteer scheduling software handles shift creation, capacity limits, automated reminders, and roster visibility in one place, without requiring a full-time coordinator to manage it. Ripple does all of that and adds a discovery layer so you're filling shifts, not just managing them.

How do you reduce volunteer no-shows?

The two biggest drivers of no-shows are poor communication and unclear expectations. Ripple's automated reminders and detailed listing format address both. Volunteers know exactly what to expect and get reminded automatically so you're not chasing anyone the night before.

Can you manage recurring volunteer programs on Ripple?

Partly, today. One event carries as many shift sessions as you need, so an ongoing program runs as a single listing with its full schedule attached, and you can bulk-upload a calendar of events from a spreadsheet. Repeating a shift pattern automatically, and saving a program as a reusable template, are still to come.

How do you track volunteer hours?

Volunteers check in digitally on the day and their hours are logged automatically. You see a complete record per event and per volunteer, with totals available in your impact dashboard whenever you need them.

Ripple makers

The coordinators who were doing it the hard way.

Illustrative of the problems Ripple was built to solve.

“We used to spend more time on volunteer coordination than the actual program. Ripple cut our admin down sharply in the first month.”
A volunteer coordinator at a youth literacy nonprofit, Inner West.
“As a small grassroots group we have no marketing budget. Ripple gave us visibility we never had before. We filled our recent events faster than we ever have.”
A community organiser on a harbour foreshore regeneration project.
“More people come back now. They follow our profile and turn up for the next event without us doing anything. That changed everything.”
A programs manager at a refugee resettlement charity, Western Sydney.
“A big crew showed up on time, prepared, and knowing exactly what they were doing. The Ripple listing did the briefing work for us. First time we've ever felt genuinely organised at that scale.”
An events lead at an environmental nonprofit, Northern Beaches.
“I was sceptical because we'd tried other volunteer platforms and they were all terrible. Ripple is the first one that felt like it was actually designed by someone who'd run a volunteer program before.”
An operations director at a homelessness service, CBD.
“Our volunteers skew younger and more engaged than before. I think it's because Ripple attracts people actively looking to give back rather than people who got guilted into it.”
A community programs coordinator at an aged care group, Eastern Suburbs.

Start your ripple

Your next volunteer is already on Ripple.

They opened the app this morning looking for something to do this weekend. List your event and let them find you.

Post your first event Talk to the team

Free to get started. No technical setup required.