SnapDonate Lets You Give To Charity Via Your Smartphone

Mike Moore,
SnapDonate charity donation app

New image recognition app allows you to make donations from your device’s camera

It is now easier than ever to donate money to charity via your mobile device following the launch of a new app that looks to streamline the process via image recognition.

SnapDonate utilises a smartphone’s camera to detect a charity’s logo before connecting the users to its page on fundraising site JustGiving, where they can pledge as much as they like, starting from £2.

The free app is available to download from today via both Google Play and the iOS App Store. Donors will need to have a registered JustGiving account, but the app charges no fees, shows no ads and stores no personal data about its users.

SnapDonate app charity donationShortfall

So far, the likes of Cancer Research UK, Marie Curie UK and Independent Age have tested the app and are currently looking in to how they can use it in their future fundraising campaigns.

The app’s founders say that SnapDonate can help improve the shortfall that many charities are experiencing as more of us shun the use of coins for card and digital payments.

Research from the Charities Aid Foundation found that the British public gifts around £1.6 billion to good causes each year, but increasingly does so through non-cash methods.

“In all the years I ran Busking Cancer to raise funds for Cancer Research UK, it was incredibly frustrating to see the look in people’s eyes when they were inspired to donate during a gig but just didn’t have cash on them,” said Mark Warrick, SnapDonate’s founder and CTO.

“I vowed to enable people to help the causes they care about, without making it a chore for charities. The new SnapDonate app is the first fruit of this labour of love. It is our gift to society.”

JustGiving has helped 22 million people raise over $3 billion for 13,000 causes since its inception in 2000.

“SnapDonate is one the most creative apps we’ve seen built since we opened up JustGiving’s platform to developers,” said Chris Field, the company’s head of global partnership development.

“It’s also a really innovative way to embed giving in peoples’ lives and shows how much scope there is to use JustGiving to help people in new ways.”

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