We seek charities that we can confidently recommend to individual, casual (i.e., non-professional, non-expert) donors. We feel that such charities should be:

• Proven. Casual donors should not fund experiments; they should fund charities that can and do demonstrate their impact in terms of lives changed. More on this criterion here.
• Cost-effective. We seek charities that provide high "bang for the buck," in terms of changing many lives (significantly) for relatively little money. Available cost-effectiveness estimates involve a great deal of uncertainty and approximation; we consider all programs within a certain range (which varies by cause) to be "highly cost-effective" and distinguish between them based on other factors. More on this criterion here.
• Scalable, i.e., able to use more funds productively. It isn't enough to identify a strong program; we seek to identify strong programs that can productively use more donor funding. As such, we do not recommend projects and programs within charities (all our ratings apply to organizations, not sub-programs), and we do not recommend charities that show signs of being overfunded. More on this criterion here.
  
• Transparent. All of the information necessary to assess the three criteria above should be shared, upon request, if not publicly on the charity's website. Donors should prefer charities that they - or others like them - can personally vet and hold accountable if they so choose.