I wrote recently about the drop in giving among younger people, and it’s a statistic I can’t stop thinking about. Partly that’s professional, but partly it’s personal. I’ve got a 15 year old, and watching him and his friends navigate the world gives me a front-row seat to just how differently this generation engages with everything, including the causes they care about. So I’ve come back to this properly, because I think there’s something charities can actually do about it, and a lot of it starts with your website.

Here’s the headline that should worry every charity in the UK. In 2017, 55% of 16-24 year olds gave to charity. By 2024, that had fallen to just 36%, according to the Charities Aid Foundation’s UK Giving Report 2025. That’s a drop of roughly a third in seven years, and it makes young people the least likely age group to donate.

At the same time, older donors are propping up the sector. People aged 65 and over remain the most generous, and the overall total given actually keeps rising because the people who do give are giving more. But that masks a real problem. If the youngest generation isn’t building a giving habit now, who funds the sector in twenty years?

The good news is that this isn’t a story about a selfish generation who don’t care. The evidence points somewhere much more useful, and much more fixable. Young people do care about causes. They’re just engaging on completely different terms, and most charity websites haven’t caught up.

Why younger people have stopped giving (it’s not what you think)

It would be easy to assume young people simply care less. The data says otherwise.

The reasons for the decline are specific and, mostly, addressable. Affordability is the biggest factor across every age group, and younger people are genuinely squeezed by rent, bills, and insecure work. That part is real and no website redesign fixes it.

But the other reasons are more interesting. Younger people are more likely than any other group to say they weren’t interested, didn’t think about giving, or simply weren’t asked. The CAF report also highlights something easy to overlook: the decline of cash has removed the small, spontaneous donations that used to be how young people started giving. No more coins in a collection tin, no more spare change to a street fundraiser. Those small first moments of giving, the ones that build a lifelong habit, have quietly disappeared.

That last point matters enormously. It tells us the problem isn’t a lack of care. It’s a lack of accessible entry points. The tin has gone, and for many charities, nothing has replaced it in the digital spaces where young people actually spend their time.

Rebuilding those entry points online is exactly where your website comes in.

What the next generation actually wants

Before we get to specific design decisions, it helps to understand what drives younger supporters. The research is remarkably consistent on this.

Younger donors rally around issues, not institutions. They give to causes they believe in rather than to organisations out of loyalty. Your brand matters less than the problem you’re solving and whether they believe you’re solving it.

They expect transparency and proof. Younger people are more sceptical of charities and want evidence before they engage. They want to see where money goes and what it achieves, presented clearly and honestly.

They want to feel part of something bigger. Research from Give.org found that nearly half of Gen Z donors attribute their giving to a desire to be part of something larger than themselves. Community and belonging matter as much as the transaction.

They give online, and they expect it to be easy. The overwhelming majority of younger donors give digitally and expect a frictionless, mobile-first experience. Anything clunky loses them.

They trust people more than logos. Younger supporters are heavily influenced by peers, creators, and real human stories rather than polished institutional messaging.

None of this is exotic or unreachable. It just requires designing your website around how this generation actually behaves, rather than how charity websites have traditionally worked.

How to design your website for younger supporters

Here’s where it gets practical. These are the changes that make the biggest difference, roughly in order of impact.

Make giving effortless on a phone

If your donation process takes more than a few taps on a mobile, you’re losing younger donors. This generation gives online and does most of it on their phones. A donation form that’s slow, asks for too much information, or isn’t properly mobile-optimised is a wall between a willing supporter and your cause.

Strip your donation journey back to the essentials. Ask only for what you genuinely need. Offer digital wallet options like Apple Pay and Google Pay, which younger donors strongly prefer because they remove the friction of typing card details. Every extra field, every extra step, every moment of confusion costs you donations.

This is often the single highest-impact change a charity can make, and it usually doesn’t require a full rebuild. I’ve written separately about the donation button that’s costing you thousands, which goes deep on exactly where donation forms leak and how to fix them.

Show your impact clearly and honestly

Younger supporters want proof before they give. A vague mission statement doesn’t cut it. They want to see what you actually achieve, presented in a way they can scan and trust.

This is where a well-designed impact page earns its place, with clear numbers, real stories, and honest financial transparency. Show where the money goes. Show what changes because of it. Younger donors are more sceptical of charities than older ones, and transparency is how you earn their trust.

Thread those proof points throughout the site too, not just on one page. A striking statistic near your donation button does more to convince a cautious young supporter than any amount of institutional language.

Lead with the cause, not the organisation

Younger people give to issues, not institutions. That has real implications for how your homepage and key pages are structured.

Instead of opening with “We are a leading charity established in 1987,” lead with the problem you exist to solve and the change you’re creating. Make the cause the hero, not your organisation. Young supporters want to know what’s wrong in the world and how they can be part of putting it right. Your history and credentials matter, but they come second to the mission.

Use real stories and real people

Polished corporate messaging doesn’t land with a generation raised on authentic, unfiltered content. Real stories from real people do.

Use genuine photography over stock images. Feature the actual people your work affects, with their permission. Let beneficiaries, volunteers, and supporters speak in their own words. Video, in particular, resonates strongly with younger audiences, so even simple, authentic video content can be far more powerful than a glossy produced film.

The goal is to feel human and real, not corporate and distant.

Create ways to belong, not just donate

Because younger supporters want to be part of something, giving them ways to engage beyond a one-off donation builds far stronger relationships.

Think about newsletter signups that promise genuine community and updates, not just fundraising asks. Make it easy to follow campaigns, share content with peers, sign a petition, or take an action that isn’t financial. For many young people, their first engagement with your cause won’t be money. It’ll be a share, a sign-up, or a small action, and that’s the beginning of a relationship that can grow over time.

Design your site to welcome that first small step, not just to extract a donation.

Build in shareability

Younger supporters are influenced by their peers and spread the causes they care about through their own networks. Your website should make that effortless.

Make sure your pages share well on social media, with good preview images and clear headlines that pull through automatically. Create content worth sharing, whether that’s a powerful impact statistic, a compelling story, or a campaign people want to rally behind. When a young supporter shares your cause with their network, that’s more valuable than almost any advertising you could buy, because it comes with the trust of a personal recommendation.

Get the basics right: speed and accessibility

None of the above matters if your site is slow or hard to use. Younger users have little patience for pages that take too long to load or don’t work properly on their phones.

A fast, accessible, mobile-first website is the foundation everything else is built on. This generation will abandon a slow site without a second thought, and they judge credibility partly on how modern and functional your digital presence feels.

Where to start

You don’t need to do all of this at once, and you certainly don’t need a full rebuild to begin.

If I were advising a charity worried about reaching younger supporters, I’d start with the donation journey. Make giving effortless on a phone, add digital wallet options, and strip out every unnecessary step. That single change often has the fastest, clearest return, and it’s the kind of work that can be scoped as a targeted improvement rather than a full rebuild.

Next, I’d look at your impact. Can a sceptical 20-year-old land on your site and understand what you achieve within seconds? If not, that’s your next priority.

Then work through the rest as budget and time allow: leading with the cause, using real stories, creating ways to belong, building in shareability, and making sure the technical foundations are solid.

The charities that take this seriously now will be the ones with committed supporters in twenty years. The ones that don’t may find their donor base quietly ageing out.

The bottom line

The drop in younger giving is real, and it’s a genuine warning for the sector. But it isn’t evidence that young people don’t care. They care deeply. They’ve just changed how they engage, and the old routes into giving, the collection tin and the street fundraiser, have faded without digital equivalents taking their place.

Your website can be that equivalent. It can be the accessible, trustworthy, human entry point that turns a cause-motivated young person into a lifelong supporter. But only if it’s designed with them in mind.

The next generation of supporters is out there, and they do want to help. The question is whether your website makes it easy for them to start.

Need help making your website work for younger supporters?

Whether it’s streamlining your donation journey, building an impact page that earns trust, or a full rebuild designed with the next generation in mind, this is exactly the kind of work I do with charities and social enterprises.

Tell me about your project, or book a free review for a no-pressure look at where your website could work harder to reach younger supporters.