Hey,

We're back.

Conference Details:

• Dates: July 12-14, 2026
• Venue: Festsaal, Kreuzberg, Berlin
• Get your ticket: https://www.localfirstconf.com/

The theme is user empowerment in an age of fluid software.

LLM-assisted coding and AI agents are the loudest things in the room right now. But we're here to think long-term: what does computing look like in 3, 5, 10 years, if we keep our values intact? Data ownership. User agency. Software that works for people.

This year, we're going broader.

"Local-first" as a term was popularized by a 2019 essay, but the idea is older and wider than that. In 2026, we want the conference to reflect that — a gathering place for our community and the adjacent communities building in the same spirit. That means we want to hear from people working on:

• Open social protocols (ATproto, ActivityPub, etc.)
• Encrypted messaging (Signal, Matrix, etc.)
• Peer-to-peer networking
• Local and open-weight AI models
• Malleable software in the age of LLMs
• Open source platforms (KDE, GNOME, Godot, Firefox, etc.)
• Self-sovereign identity
• And yes — the usual local-first production stories, UX challenges, and the hard lessons

The CFP is open

We're sourcing most of our talks from community submissions this year. We have a short list of anchor speakers, but the program will be built from what you submit. We've also published a Request for Topics — a wishlist of talks we'd love to see, from specific communities we want to connect with.

Pre-conference Events

Planning to arrive early? Join us for informal community gatherings on July 11. More details coming soon.

After Party

Be sure to join us on July 14th for the afterparty.

Sponsorship Opportunities

Interested in sponsoring? We still have packages available – reach out to emma@localfirstconf.com to learn more.

We can't wait to see you in Berlin this July!

The Local-First Conf Team