Platform guide
How Seedling Works
Everything you need to know about using Seedling — whether you're here to volunteer or to find volunteers.
👤
Your Profile
- ✓Set your display name, bio, city, avatar, and privacy preferences.
- ✓Tag the causes you care about (up to 10) — used to power your personalised shift suggestions.
- ✓List your skills so organizations know what you bring.
- ✓Optionally verify your identity with a government ID for a verified badge on your profile.
🔍
Finding Opportunities
- ✓Browse all upcoming shifts or switch to Suggested to see only shifts matching your cause interests.
- ✓Search by shift name, organization, or type a city/town to center results anywhere in the world.
- ✓Adjust your search radius (10 – 100 mi) with one tap — your saved city stays unchanged.
- ✓Toggle between list and map views.
📋
Signing Up & Showing Up
- ✓One-click signup for any open shift. Join the waitlist when a shift is full — you'll be promoted automatically if a spot opens.
- ✓Your upcoming shifts appear on your dashboard with countdown timers and quick check-in links.
- ✓Miss a shift? No-shows are tracked and affect your reliability rating visible to organizations.
📊
Your Dashboard
- ✓See your next upcoming shift front and center with date, time, org, and location.
- ✓Weekly calendar showing all your confirmed shifts at a glance.
- ✓Impact stats: total shifts, hours volunteered, causes supported, and organizations served.
- ✓Activity feed of your recent completions, sign-ups, and milestones.
- ✓Weekly streak counter — stay consistent across back-to-back calendar weeks.
🏅
Badges
- ✓Earn 45+ badges across six families: Milestones, Streaks, Cause Champions, Breadth, Loyalty, and Character.
- ✓Badges are awarded automatically as you hit thresholds — no action needed.
- ✓See your progress toward every badge in the badge gallery, grouped by family.
- ✓Feature up to 3 earned badges — they appear as emoji icons next to your name everywhere on the platform.
💬
Messaging
- ✓Message any organization directly from their public profile or a shift page.
- ✓All conversations are threaded and available in your messages inbox.
- ✓Unread message count shown on the nav bar so you never miss a reply.
Ready to make an impact?
Create your free volunteer account and start browsing opportunities near you.