CFP is open until April 10th

The Rails World 2025 Call for Papers is now open!

This year we are looking for talks that highlight the power and competitive advantage of Rails through real-world case studies, deep technical dives, best practices, or problem-solving discussions, as well as stories of how Rails enables solo developers and small and mid-sized companies to build and scale (both apps and businesses) with ease. Find more info about possible themes below.

Rails World will take place on September 4 & 5th, 2025 in a familiar location: the Beurs van Berlage in Amsterdam. This year there will be 24 talks and keynotes across two tracks and approximately 800 attendees. As always, preference will be for technical talks with concrete takeaways, and original talks that will be presented for the first time at Rails World 2025.

Submit your proposal here.

The CFP will remain open until April 10th, and we aim to inform all applicants if they are accepted (or not) before tickets sale opens in late April or May (date TBD).

What kind of talks are we looking for?

We will especially be on the lookout for talks that fall into a few specific themes:

• Rails 8 in the wild: Today Rails is stronger, faster, more stable and more secure than ever thanks to Rails 8 and its default frameworks. What lessons have you learned from migrating to Rails 8? How have the new default features impacted your production apps, and what real-world experiences can you share?
• Rails as the One Person Framework: How has Rails empowered you (or others) as a solo developer to build and launch a competitive business? What strategies, tools, and workflows make it possible?
• Startups and mid-sized stories: How is Rails being used in your startup, mid-sized company, or in your small team? Can you share a case study on how it enables fast, efficient development without a large engineering department?
• Focus on the frontend: How are you using Hotwire, Turbo, and other Rails-native solutions in your projects? Or, on the flipside: What other frontend frameworks do you think work well with Rails, and what insights can you share on integrating them with Rails?
• Advanced technical topics: What deep technical challenges have you tackled in Rails? Can you share insights on optimizing database performance, scaling strategies, or improving request handling and background processing?
• The competitive advantage of Rails: What makes Rails stand out in today’s tech landscape? Whether it’s the ease of building with small teams, its long-term stability, or simply the joy of working with it, how has Rails given you a competitive edge?
• The Business of Rails: While the focus of Rails World is technical talks, we have a limited amount of space for talks that fall outside of the scope of code. Whether it’s running a SaaS, consulting, freelancing, or maintaining an open-source project, what lessons have you learned about profitability, growth, marketing, and longevity in the Rails ecosystem? How do you build and sustain a successful business with Rails?
• Other: And finally, we will also be on the lookout for talks that align Rails with emerging or important current trends in our industry right now, such as AI, LLMs, security, PWAs, observability, monitoring, accessibility, or the move from microservices back to monoliths, to name a few.

Speaker benefits:

We want the experience of speaking at Rails World to be one of the best and most inviting in the industry. If you are chosen as a speaker, here is what is included:

• Free admission to the conference, naturally.
• Accommodation: The Rails Foundation will cover 3 nights hotel accommodation for each speaker in the speaker hotel (Sept 3-6). It is not required that you stay in this hotel, but the offer only extends to the hotel of our choosing. It is not transferable to another hotel.
• Speaker dinner: Speakers will be invited to a private dinner hosted by Rails Foundation Core & Contributing members on Sept 4.
• A speaker gift

Good luck to all who apply!

Questions? Reach out to world@rubyonrails.org or sign up for the Rails Foundation mailing list to be notified when ticket dates are announced.

Interested in sponsoring? Check out the prospectus and get in touch at sponsors@rubyonrails.org.

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Rails World and all of the initiatives from the Rails Foundation are made possible thanks to the support of the foundation’s Core members Cookpad, Doximity, Fleetio, GitHub, Intercom, Procore, Shopify, 1Passwordand 37signals, and Contributing members AppSignal, BigBinary, Cedarcode, Clio, Gusto, Higher Pixels, Planet Argon, makandra, Renuo, Saeloun, and TableCheck. Meet all these companies this year at Rails World!