This is part of the Annual Report 2025 from The Document Foundation, the non-profit that coordinates the LibreOffice project and community.
TDF exists because of a large, dynamic global community — volunteers, ecosystem companies and committed end users who support our work with donations of both time and money. The 2025 accounts tell a clear story: a foundation that grew significantly, while keeping its finances transparent and its spending tied to its mission.
A year of strong growth in income
Total income for 2025 reached € 2,175,997, a substantial increase on the € 1,387,589 recorded in 2024. The growth came from three distinct sources, and it is worth being precise about each.
The largest share, € 1,976,825, came from donations — overwhelmingly from individual users and small businesses, mostly in Europe. This was the fifth consecutive year in which donations exceeded one million euro, and the highest figure to date. Part of this increase was organic, reflecting the continued strength of LibreOffice downloads. A further part can be attributed to a concrete change: in mid-2025 we introduced a new in-product update notification on Windows, which periodically — after every major release and selected minor ones — informs users that an update is available, presents the new features, and invites them to support the project with a donation. The effect was immediately visible as a step-up in donations from the moment it was deployed, and it is keeping donations at a higher level into 2026. We mention this openly, because transparency about *why* the numbers move is as important as the numbers themselves.
The second source was income from the sale of LibreOffice through online stores, sponsoring and related commercial activity, which together generated € 168,975. The Apple App Store (€ 118,942) and the Microsoft Store (€ 35,393) accounted for most of this. The third source was € 30,197 in income from securities held under the foundation’s asset management.
How the money was spent
Total expenditure for 2025 was € 1,457,343. The breakdown by category shows where donor money goes.
- Staff and operations remained by far the largest commitment, at € 1,091,032. This covers salaries (€ 406,736), statutory social security contributions (€ 93,244) and freelancers (€ 591,052) — the people who keep infrastructure, communication, administration and project coordination running, in order to share knowledge, support the community in its activities, and enable contributors to do their work.
- Tenders. As in 2024, no development tenders were funded in 2025. Tenders related to LibreOffice development remain on hold, and will be resumed based on the development strategy currently under discussion according to the new Procurement Policy.
- Events and community support amounted to roughly € 87,000, including the LibreOffice Conference (developer conference, € 51,184), community projects (€ 15,014) and student scholarships (€ 17,368), together with marketing initiatives. These funds support the events and local activities that hold the global community together, and help us to share knowledge around the world.
- Infrastructure and hosting came to € 51,420, covering the hosting, virtual machines, services and domains that underpin the project’s technical independence — a foundational asset we continue to prioritise.
- Legal and administrative expenses totalled roughly € 92,000, including accounting and the preparation of financial statements (€ 34,164), legal advice and counselling (€ 36,597 across project and general legal work), and insurances (€ 4,626).
Cost of fundraising. Receiving donations is not free. In 2025, payment-processing and banking fees came to roughly € 98,000 — Stripe fees of € 46,446 and bank transfer and money-transfer fees of € 51,190. These are simply the cost of doing business: they scale with the volume of donations we receive. It is worth adding that these figures do not capture the full picture, because PayPal’s currency-conversion costs are embedded in the transactions and not separately visible — though they are comparable in scale to the Stripe fees. We report this plainly so that no reader underestimates what it costs to collect the donations that fund our work.
Results and transparency
After expenses, the charitable entity closed the year with a result of € 554,476, asset management contributed € 21,263, and the commercial business operations returned a profit of € 142,916.
Transparency remains one of TDF’s defining characteristics — towards our donors, contributors, community and users. Our accounting is handled by a professional accountant, and our complete ledgers, listing all income and spending broken down by project, are published on our public wiki at https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/TDF/Ledgers with only a few items obfuscated for privacy. As in previous years, and given the scale the foundation has reached, our books have been audited, and the Board continues to work with the authorities in Berlin to implement the improvements the audit recommended.
To everyone who contributed time, skills, resources and money in 2025: thank you. The foundation’s strength is your achievement.
Note: The expense categories above are indicative groupings drawn from the foundation’s accounts. They exclude VAT flows and certain material costs that the ledger handles separately, so the categories are not intended to reconcile arithmetically with the per-sphere annual results. The authoritative, fully itemised figures are published in the ledgers.
Facts Only
* Total income for 2025 reached €2,175,997, up from €1,387,589 in 2024.
* Donations accounted for €1,976,825, mostly from individual users and small businesses in Europe.
* Income from online store sales, sponsoring, and commercial activity totaled €168,975.
* Income from asset management securities was €30,197.
* Total expenditure for 2025 was €1,457,343.
* Staff and operations cost €1,091,032, including salaries (€406,736), social security contributions (€93,244), and freelancers (€591,052).
* Events and community support cost approximately €87,000.
* Infrastructure and hosting cost €51,420.
* Legal and administrative expenses totaled approximately €92,000.
* The net result after expenses was €554,476.
Executive Summary
The Document Foundation reported total income of €2,175,997 in 2025, an increase from €1,387,589 in 2024. The largest income source was donations, totaling €1,976,825, primarily from individual users and small businesses in Europe. This growth was partly attributed to organic increases in LibreOffice downloads and a new in-product update notification introduced in mid-2025, which prompted further donations. Other income streams included €168,975 from online store sales through platforms like the Apple App Store and Microsoft Store, and €30,197 from asset management securities.
Expenditures for 2025 totaled €1,457,343. The largest expenditure category was staff and operations, accounting for €1,091,032, which covered salaries, social security contributions, and freelancer payments. Other significant spending included €87,000 on events and community support, €51,420 on infrastructure and hosting, and approximately €92,000 on legal and administrative expenses. The cost of fundraising, including payment processing fees, amounted to roughly €98,000. After accounting for these expenditures, the entity realized a result of €554,476, plus asset management contributions and a commercial profit of €142,916.
Full Take
The data reveals a structure where donor engagement is tightly linked to product updates, suggesting that transparency about the mechanism of funding acts as a lever for sustained financial support. The shift in donation patterns, spurred by an in-product notification system, exemplifies a feedback loop: action leads to visibility, which reinforces contribution. This suggests that value transfer—providing users with features and tools—is not just a product goal but a critical financial strategy for sustaining the non-profit mission.
The expenditure breakdown clearly prioritizes human capital (staff/freelancers) far above operational costs or external outreach, reflecting an investment in community coordination and knowledge sharing as the primary function of the foundation. The high cost associated with fundraising fees highlights that achieving growth requires a significant overhead in managing financial transactions, which must be factored into assessing net impact.
The final result shows profitability alongside mission fulfillment, though the distinction between commercial operations and charitable results is noted separately. This dynamic raises questions about how external pressures on commercial activities interface with the community-focused goals when the core engine of income relies heavily on voluntary contributions tied to software use. What is the long-term sustainability of basing growth primarily on reactive donation strategies versus sustained, predictable revenue streams?
Sentinel — Human
The text reads like a formal, fact-based excerpt from an organizational report, characterized by precise accounting details and necessary transparency caveats, suggesting strong grounding in real data rather than pure generation.