bay area 2026 | february 6th - 8th

Join us at the frontiers of non-human welfare

Sentient Futures Summit is the meeting place of AI experts, welfare researchers, animal advocates, and passionate thinkers seeking to have an impact. We’ll spend 3 days networking and learning how to steer AI and other technologies for the welfare of animals and potentially sentient artificial minds. 

This is the 5th conference of our series, which has served as a meeting place for hundreds of thinkers, innovators and advocates focused on making sure nonhuman sentient beings don’t get left behind as we design systems that will scale in the future.

Help us in advancing the field!

Speakers

  • David J. Gunkel

    Distinguished Professor, Northern Illinois University

  • Raphaëlle Martínez

    Director of Digital Mobilization, International Council of Animal Welfare

  • Pengpeng Hu

    Senior Lecturer and Associate Professor, University of Manchester

  • Jamie McLaughlin

    President, Three Pearls Charities Inc.

  • Noah Behrick

    AI Brains Product Owner & GenAI Advisor, Atlas Copco

  • Allen Lu

    Creative Engineer

  • Jeff Kremer

    Animal Welfare Advocate

  • Rikard Saqe

    Graduate Student at the University of Waterloo

  • Matt Fay

    Principal Engineer, Prolific Machines

  • Christopher Krüger

    Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency

Featured Guests

  • Lewis Bollard

    Farmed Animal Welfare Program Director, Open Philanthropy

  • David Pearce

    Co-founder, Humanity+

  • Jan Leike

    Alignment Lead, Anthropic

  • James Özden

    Director of Philanthropy, Mobius

  • David Meyer

    Founder, AdoptaPet.com and Food Systems Innovation

  • Yaqi Grover

    Agritech Investor, Lever VC

  • Aaron Boddy

    Co-founder, Shrimp Welfare Project

  • Matthew Dominguez

    Executive Director, Compassion in World Farming (USA)

  • Josh Balk

    CEO, The Accountability Board

  • Robin Larson

    Member of Technical Staff, Anthropic

  • Christopher Berry

    Executive Director, Nonhuman Rights Project

  • Gabriel Wildgen

    Senior Associate VP of Public Policy, The Humane League

  • Bob Fischer

    Senior Researcher, Rethink Priorities

  • Mikko Järvenpää

    Founder, Worldshapers

  • Esben Kran

    Co-Founder, Seldon Lab

  • Marcus Abramovich

    Entrepreneur and Investor

What To Expect

  • “The most valuable part for me was the 1-on-1s. I’ve found people with expertise on things I need help with, in projects I’ve set out to do. I’ve met a lot of people and learnt a lot about digital minds welfare and other kinds of sentience, which is something I wouldn’t explore on my own. It was useful.”

    – Shrilaxmi Patil, Impactful Giving

  • “I loved how the conference brought together numerous groups that don't typically interact. Animal advocates could meet and discuss topics with academics studying precision livestock farming and philosophers researching animal consciousness & digital minds. ”

    – Richie Manandhar-Richardson, Bryant Research & Good Growth Co.

  • “The AIADM unconference was full of interesting people and interesting ideas. By putting different disciplines in the room together, Sentient Futures are helping animal and AI safety advocates think about problems that are neglected and unusual, interesting and important.”

    – Ben Stevenson, Centre for Wild Animal Welfare

  • “I found that the unconference sessions led to real, tangible project ideas, and I left feeling like we're on the cusp of something huge for animal welfare!"

    – Aaron Boddy, Shrimp Welfare Project

  • “We presented our vision to map the most important sources of farm animal suffering over the next few years... The audience's enthusiasm and interest in our work were truly motivating.”

    – Wladimir J. Alonso, Researcher and Director, Center for Welfare Metrics

  • "AI has the potential to affect nonhuman animals everywhere, and over the past two years, this conference has played a key role in accelerating research about this important and neglected topic. Highly recommended for anyone with an interest in AI ethics or animal ethics."

    – Jeff Sebo, Director, NYU Center for Mind, Ethics, and Policy

Get involved

volunteer

All volunteers receive a complimentary ticket, and only work for about half of the conference – it’s a great way to meet people and contribute to the event whilst still having time to engage with the content.

speak and facilitate

Apply to give a talk, lightning talk, run a stand at our organisation fair, or facilitate any other sessions you’d be interested in seeing. Speakers and facilitators receive complimentary tickets.

suggest ideas

If you have other ideas for featured guests, sessions we should run or topics we could cover, let use know here – we’d love to hear your ideas!

Satellite events

Pre-EAG Co-working
 Feb 9-13th, 10am-6pm | Mox

Join us for co-working during the week between SFS and EAG Bay Area! We’ll have some cozy space set aside at our conference venue complete with monitors, free snacks, a nap room and (optional) standing desks.

EA Global Bay Area
Feb 13-15th 2026 | Hilton Union Square, San Francisco

EA Global (EAG) gathers speakers and attendees from the Effective Altruism community who are dedicated to making a positive impact. EAG Bay Area will highlight the broad spectrum of effective altruism causes, such as farmed animal welfare, global health and development, biosecurity, AI safety, & more.

SFS Sunday Party
February 15th, 7pm-11.30pm | Mox

Come and join us on the Sunday evening after SFS for an informal afterparty!  Sign up through the Partiful link.

… and more!

Previous events

Check out this highlight from AIADM London 2025, or other videos on our YouTube channel.

You can read about our previous conferences & unconferences here.

Registration

Location

Mox SF

1680 Mission St, San Francisco, CA 94103

Our venue is right on the edge of San Francisco’s famous Mission District, and is only a 15-minute walk from 16th St BART station. It offers a variety of different spaces, including rooms for talks, focused working, 1-on-1s, group discussions, kitchens and even a nap room!

Attendees will have complimentary access to this co-working space the following week.

FAQs

  • SFS will be very similar to our AIADM events – there’ll be longer talks, shorter lightning talks, an organisation fair, meet-ups and workshops – as well as sessions organised by attendees during the summit! 

    We feel that the name “Sentient Futures Summit” is simpler and more aligned with our rebrand, as well as being more cause-neutral on what it means to improve the future for all sentient beings.


  • Through the registration form near the top of this page, or here.
    Any problems, please contact: bay2026@sentientfutures.ai

  • You can apply here before the end of the year. This form is for talks, lightning talks, a stand at the organisation fair, and any other sessions you might be interested in running. We’d love to hear your ideas!

    If you have a great idea for a speaker/ other content that would work but don’t want to contribute yourself, you can still fill out the above form! We’d love to hear your ideas.

  • You can apply here. All volunteers receive a free complimentary ticket, and only work for about half of the conference – it’s a great way to meet people and contribute to the event whilst still having time to engage with the content.

  • We don’t want financial circumstances to be a barrier for those who want to attend our events. Aside from volunteering (see above), we also have tiered pricing: you can select a financial aid option at registration to get 50% off the ticket price, or apply for a partial or full scholarship.

  • While there are currently no plans for any virtual meet-ups, we are expecting some of the talks to be livestreamed on our YouTube channel.

  • Please reach out to Jonah at bay2026@sentientfutures.ai with any questions you may have!

  • We’ve reserved some space in Mox during the week between SFS and EAG for some attendees to co-work with us. Please sign up using the link further up on this page!

Planning Team

  • Constance Li

    founder and executive director

  • Jonah Woodward

    event lead

  • Carolina Oliveira

    design volunteer