TED Fellows Impact

Hundreds of Fellows. Millions of lives changed.

A revolutionary approach to vaccine delivery in rural Africa. Legal challenges to abuses in state-sponsored surveillance. Prosthetics that help amputees “feel” their new limb. Through these and hundreds more innovative projects, TED Fellows are improving lives around the world.

86% of Fellows say the program helped them achieve impact
83% of Fellows say the program helped them reach new audiences
85% of Fellows participate beyond the first year of their fellowship
Future Shaping

Honored, published, funded—and just getting started.

They are inventors and educators, activists and artists, science geeks and policy wonks. Even so, all new TED Fellows have two things in common: They are still early in their careers—and they are approaching a problem in a new way -- whether that's curing disease, fighting climate change, or combating inequality.

Across six continents, TED Fellows have been recognized with prestigious awards and millions of dollars in funding. They’ve been published in books, science periodicals, and professional journals. They’ve spoken at trade conferences, business roundtables, and government hearings. Their art has sparked global movements.

The TED Fellows program seeks to help amplify both their recognition, and the impact of their ideas.

Learn about the program

"The TED Fellows have given me hope for a shared, global future."

Nassim Assefi

Global Women’s Health Specialist

“The TED Fellowship is magical pixie dust / rocket fuel. A really powerful catalyst.”

Nina Tandon

Biomedical Engineer

“It was monumental. The Fellows team and TED community gave me incredible personal support and friendship and have accelerated the impact my team and I are making by several years, which equates to hundreds of thousands more people seeing who otherwise wouldn't. It has been nothing short of amazing.”

Andrew Bastawrous

Social Entrepreneur + Eye Surgeon

“The TED Fellows program changed my life – I would not have been able to build my own path through academia and through the pandemic years without the strength, inspiration and friendship of this community.”

Shohini Ghose

Quantum Physicist

Watch their TED Talks

Browse more Fellows Talks

Will Potter

The secret US prisons you've never heard of before

Investigative journalist Will Potter is the only reporter who has been inside a Communications Management Unit, or CMU, within a US prison. These units were opened secretly, and radically alter how prisoners are treated -- even preventing them from hugging their children. Potter, a TED Fellow, shows us who is imprisoned here, and how the government is trying to keep them hidden. "The message was clear," he says. "Don't talk about this place." Find sources for this talk at willpotter.com/cmu

Watch video

Monica Malta

How community-led research drives social change

What's the best way to develop and implement solutions to social problems? TED Fellow and human rights activist Monica Malta discusses why traditional, top-down policymaking often fails by excluding key voices and missing root causes. She shows why community-based participatory research — a method that empowers communities to co-create solutions to their own challenges — taps into the resilience and strength of everyday people to be leaders of change.

Watch video

Marcin Jakubowski

Open-sourced blueprints for civilization

Using wikis and digital fabrication tools, TED Fellow Marcin Jakubowski is open-sourcing the blueprints for 50 farm machines, allowing anyone to build their own tractor or harvester from scratch. And that's only the first step in a project to write an instruction set for an entire self-sustaining village (starting cost: $10,000).

Watch video

“The TED Fellows program has both consciously and subconsciously given me the confidence (and playbook) to build multiple institutions, startups, and communities of my own.”

Keolu Fox

Genome Scientist + Indigenous Futurist

“My TED training was instrumental in communicating complex scientific concepts to the general public and in persuading politicians to adopt scientifically sound approaches especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.”

Edsel Salvaña

Molecular Epidemiologist + Public Health Strategist

TED Fellows impact at a glance

Change that gets noticed

200M

200M people impacted by Fellows work annually

451M

451M TED Talk views

2,234

2,234 articles published by/about Fellows per year

1,303

1,303 speaking engagements each year

234

234 businesses launched

The groundbreaking work of a TED Fellow does not stay in the shadows. Each year we study the impact Fellows have on their respective fields, as measured by tangible forms of recognition. Here are some highlights from the past few years.

You can help turn innovative ideas into transformative change

Interested in signing on as a partner or giving a charitable contribution? We look forward to hearing from you.

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Our team should get back to you in a few days. In the mean time, feel free to browse recent talks by the Fellows.

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partners & individuals

We are deeply grateful to our partners and supporters for their generosity. We invite you to join them in championing social innovators.

  • Bezos Family Foundation
  • Ballmer Group
  • Anonymous
  • Kathleen Donohue & David Sze
  • André Heinz
  • Gerry Ohrstrom
  • Michael Borosky & Rob Price
  • Mark Dwight, Rickshaw Bagworks
  • Carl Haney & Jamie Ginott, Estée Lauder

The Fellows program would like to especially thank the professional coaches who date their time to working with TED Fellows: Danielle Adams, Emily Aiken, Nadia Allaudin, June Archer, Claudia Aronowitz, Peter Bailey, John Bates, Amir Bonefetami, Vikki Brock, Catherine Carr, Margaret Cary, Michael Cauley, Laura Colcord, Marcia Conner, Marianne Craig, Toni Crow, Karen Curnow, Drew Curtis, Tonya Echols, Dan Feldstein, Charles Feltman, Ben Gallagher, Dian Ginsberg, Soulaima Gourami, Alan Graham, Danielle Gustafson, Christy Haynes, Steve Heller, Geert Hofman, Colleen Jack, Nick Jekogian, Donna Karlin, Heather Kaye, Leda Kerabela, Ken Kesslin, Paul Klein, Moty Koppes, Kate Lye, Craig Miller, Gregoery Miller, Sukh Mishra, DJ Mitsch, Linda Morris, Cynder Niemela, Petra Platzer, Jess Ponce, Libby Robinson, Stephanie Rosol, Alexandra Ross, Steve Salee, Mark Setch, Julie Sgarzi, Matthew Shelley, Laura Sicola, Nancy Smyth, Marianne Vermeer, Amy Waterman and Karen Wright.