All the Biggest Announcements from bbcon 2025

bbcon 2025 brought thousands of social impact leaders together for three days of innovation, connection, and bold announcements. From seismic shifts in AI to product breakthroughs that make work easier and impact faster, this year’s event was all about helping organizations move with more confidence, connection and possibility. 

Top mainstage moments and select breakout session content will be available on demand, beginning October 14, 2025, through the free, virtual pass available on bbconference.com.

Here’s a look at the biggest moments from bbcon 2025:

More Connection with Blackbaud AI Powering Systems of Intelligent Action
We announced that, with Blackbaud AI, we’re transforming our products from systems of record into systems of intelligent action. Blackbaud AI will integrate insights from different teams and functions within organizations, like fundraising and finance. Underpinned by years of domain expertise and a wealth of data from a variety of sources, new features like AI-powered donor stewardship reports, Recognition Programs, hyper-personalized donor journeys, and more are all able to work in concert to celebrate impact, nurture loyalty, and drive engagement at scale.  Whether you’re a fundraiser seeking real-time financial updates, a finance leader exploring donor engagement, or an educator tracking student success, Blackbaud AI is designed to connect the dots and act across your organization so you can respond faster and smarter. 

More Possibility with Agentic AI that Expands Social Impact Teams
We debuted Agents for Good™—our purpose-built, virtual team members for social impact. The first will be a Development Agent—available through an Early Adopter Program (EAP) in Q4 2025 to Blackbaud Raiser’s Edge NXT® customers in the U.S.—that will autonomously manage donor cultivation plans, outreach strategies and relationship building. Unlike bolt-on tools, these agents will be embedded directly into Blackbaud’s trusted ecosystem, enabling teams to focus on building relationships and driving impact, confident that their virtual team member is working securely, efficiently and in sync with their organization’s data and workflows. In addition, we announced our vision to create an agentic ecosystem where Blackbaud AI doesn’t just coordinate its own intelligent agents—it orchestrates agents from across the entire partner landscape. In this new era, users will simply ask Blackbaud AI to accomplish a goal, and it will seamlessly delegate tasks to the right agents, whether they’re built by Blackbaud or by other providers. 

Driving Confidence with Responsible AI
Leading on new technology frontiers is a serious responsibility, and Blackbaud Chief Data and AI Officer Carrie Cobb took the stage to deliver a bold truth: “AI isn’t just transforming technology—it’s transforming responsibility. Because AI isn’t just code. It’s decisions. It’s influence.” 

In service of its commitment to responsible AI, Blackbaud has convened a coalition of companies, organizations, and leaders who share the vision of removing obstacles to responsible AI adoption for the nonprofit sector: The AI Coalition for Social Impact. Founding members include Blackbaud, Anthropic, Association of Corporate Citizenship Professionals, Association of Fundraising Professionals, Chief Executives for Corporate Purpose, Curtis Group, Databricks, Datacamp, Ellis Morgan Enterprises, GivingTuesday, Greater Purpose, OneTrust, Realized Worth, Responsible AI Institute and The Nonprofit Alliance. The coalition’s flagship initiative will be a free, platform-agnostic AI certification program designed specifically for the social impact sector. The first module in AI for Social Impact will launch later this year. 

In addition, Blackbaud announced 70+ embedded, sector-specific AI capabilities, and enhancements planned or available across our product suite. Here are the highlights*:

Corporate Impact

• Expedited Giving for YourCause®: Blackbaud is transforming the corporate and employee giving experience with new Expedited Giving functionality in YourCause. This innovation accelerates donation disbursement timelines by up to 95%, introduces modern giving options for employee donors, and enhances transparency for CSR program administrators. By seamlessly connecting YourCause’s nonprofit database,  Blackbaud Verified Newtwork, with Raiser’s Edge NXT and Blackbaud Enterprise Fundraising CRM, Blackbaud is delivering a more integrated, efficient, and impactful philanthropic ecosystem. When one of these millions of employees contributes to your organization, you get instant access to current donor data with Blackbaud delivering the donor details directly into a batch, ready for you to review and commit. You’ll spot new engagement opportunities and see clear details about every donation.
• Impact Edge™ and Blackbaud AI: Through groundbreaking integrations with True Impact® and Candid, Impact Edge now delivers predictive, outcome-based insights and rich nonprofit intelligence in a single dashboard. CSR professionals can visualize their giving, volunteering, and grantmaking efforts with dynamic AI-powered charts, track custom goals with precision, and surface vetted nonprofit partners—all through natural-language queries and narrative responses powered by Blackbaud AI.

Data Intelligence

• Prospect Insights Pro (U.S.): New updates will enable greater flexibility for users to customize their prospect segmentation strategy using predictions for list and query building, while Blackbaud AI chat will automatically leverage Prospect Insights Pro to respond to applicable user prompts about donor prospects and guide users seamlessly through the process of creating tasks and opportunities for follow-up. 
• Persistent Key (U.S.): API delivery of individual and household keys supports master data management across systems for large organizations by using our powerful referential dataset to assign unique keys to individuals and households, which can be used to match or link them across locations. Customers now can use SKY API to access these keys.

Donor Management
Blackbaud Raiser’s Edge NXT: 

• Chat for Blackbaud AI & Intelligent Assistance: Blackbaud is expanding its AI capabilities in Raiser’s Edge NXT with two powerful new features. With Chat for Blackbaud AI, customers can interact in natural language with Blackbaud’s conversational AI assistant to more efficiently summarize donor history, generate outreach content, and suggest engagement strategies. Building on this foundation, Intelligent Assistance will automate and complete complex workflows, including optimization of donor opportunities and creation of full cultivation plans to personalize stewardship, and many more capabilities to streamline fundraising workflows with greater precision and impact.
• Recognition Programs: Raiser’s Edge NXT will soon include Recognition Programs—an intelligent new way to celebrate donor impact, powered by Blackbaud AI. Whether honoring lifetime giving, annual contributions, or loyalty milestones, these programs will automate qualification, streamline stewardship workflows, and generate dynamic donor lists, enabling organizations to deliver personalized recognition and deepen donor relationships with ease.
• Expedited Giving: Raiser’s Edge NXT will be connected to the Blackbaud Verified Network (formerly NPOconnect), which is the free nonprofit portal connected to our YourCause software for facilitating employee giving, volunteering and grantmaking. This means nonprofits will soon be able to receive corporate employee donations in as little as two business days, dramatically improving cash flow and responsiveness—especially for urgent campaigns. By integrating detailed donor data directly into Raiser’s Edge NXT, Expedited Giving eliminates manual reconciliation, enhances donor stewardship and provides Blackbaud customers the unique value of the industry’s only platform connecting corporate giving with nonprofit fundraising.

Blackbaud Enterprise Fundraising CRM™:

• Microsoft Integration Milestones: Blackbaud CRM® users will now be able to leverage Blackbaud’s proprietary philanthropic dataset to gain valuable insights into donor behavior, as well as transact on Microsoft’s commercial marketplace.
• Modernized User Interface with SKY UX: The modern, dynamic, and intuitive user experience will feature new and improved navigation, streamlined workflows for faster task completion, enhanced dashboards for customizable reporting, and a fully responsive design for access on any device.
• Cloud Portal Enhancements: Blackbaud CRM will continue to release new capabilities for IT teams to manage their hosted environments which are meant to speed recurring processes, increase ease of use and accelerate user development cycle. 

Education
Blackbaud Education Management Solutions: 

• Common Records Engine: A new powerful data integration process that establishes a list of common records, listens for changes to linked records, and synchronizes common data between Blackbaud’s education management solutions and Blackbaud Raiser’s Edge NXT. This will save IT time importing and reconciling data between systems, and provide a complete view of a family’s interaction with the school; from application, to student experience, to billing and donations.  

• New Google Classroom integration: For Blackbaud Student Information System™, as well as our new integration with PowerSchool’s Schoology Learning, schools can now seamlessly sync data in real time between platforms via OneRoster and Schoology Learning, allowing teachers to export grades from Google Classroom to Blackbaud Gradebook and to import useful information from Blackbaud such as student rosters, co-teachers, grading periods and grading categories when setting up their class in Google Classroom. 

• Student Success Insights: This tool goes beyond simple reporting to provide actionable processes and tools powered by Blackbaud AI that help educators take meaningful steps toward improving student outcomes. These proactive measures include identifying students who may need extra help, managing personalized support plans, handling support documentation, and more. 

• Collections Assistant: This assistant draws on Blackbaud AI to assist School Business Offices using Blackbaud Billing Management™ by identifying priority accounts, monitoring key collections metrics, and crafting targeted communications. By flagging potential late payments early, it will promote on-time payments, reduce overdue balances, and strengthen financial stability.

Blackbaud Financial Aid Management™: 

• IRS Integration: This will provide families an enhanced IRS integration method that will streamline the financial aid process and improve review times. Families will be able to effortlessly and securely import IRS tax documents, minimizing manual tasks and providing schools with quicker, more precise award amount determinations. 

Blackbaud Award Management™: 

• Modernized Applicant User Experience: A refreshed, intuitive interface that provides streamlined navigation, modernized visuals, and improved functionality across key areas of the scholarship application process. By elevating usability and design, education institutions can offer a seamless, student-centered experience that makes scholarship applications easier to navigate.

Financials and Grantmaking
Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT®:

• Document Intelligence (Global): Now available in an EAP, this feature is transforming invoice management with Blackbaud AI, helping finance teams streamline workflows, reduce errors and enhance efficiency. By automatically extracting key invoice details from PDFs, documents, or even photos—like vendor names, amounts, dates, and line items—and summarizing content for clear review, Document Intelligence eliminates the need for tedious manual data entry. Built-in AI assists with accuracy by identifying inconsistencies, giving users greater confidence in their financial operations. Embedded within Financial Edge NXT’s Expense Management workflow, this feature eliminates the hassle of switching systems, allowing teams to focus on what matters most: advancing their mission.
• Future AI Innovation (Global): A series of transformative AI advancements are currently in development to redefine nonprofit financial management: Blackbaud announced they are taking Document Intelligence one step further and extending it to multiple types of documents – like new gift or grant agreements (this will greatly streamline cross departmental workflows between fundraising, finance and programs); AI-Powered Workflows will streamline processes such as data entry, journal setup, imports and approvals, reducing manual effort and minimizing errors; the new Smart Mapping & Import Hub automates repetitive mapping tasks and intelligently detects import types, saving finance teams valuable time; and Anomaly Detection will use AI to scan transactions for unusual patterns or potential fraud, strengthening internal controls and financial data integrity. 

Blackbaud Grantmaking™ and GrantsConnect: 

• AI-Powered Form Translator (Global): This function eliminates language barriers by enabling applicants to complete forms in their preferred language, while reviewers instantly receive the content in their selected language. This supports equity and accessibility, expanding the reach of grant makers’ funding opportunities and attracting a more diverse applicant pool. 
• AI-Powered Form Intelligence (Global): AI-Powered Form Intelligence streamlines how organizations—both applicants and funders—handle complex applications. For grant managers, Blackbaud AI helps ensure grant forms are polished and mission-aligned. For applicants, the system auto-identifies required fields, validates data in real time, and flags incomplete or inconsistent answers, all before submission.
• Automated Scoring of Incoming Grants (Global): This uses AI to pre-score applications based on a grant maker’s chosen criteria, such as eligibility, alignment to funding priorities or completeness. Reviewers can focus their energy on the highest-potential proposals, driving faster decisions and greater consistency in the review process.

Online Giving and Payments

• Fee Coverage Options for Blackbaud Luminate Online® and Blackbaud TeamRaiser® (U.S. & Canada): Native Donor Cover and Complete Cover™ fee coverage capabilities give nonprofits new ways to retain more of every online contribution. Donor Cover lets supporters voluntarily add a small amount to help offset processing fees, while Complete Cover—exclusive to Blackbaud—removes payment processing fees entirely on eligible transactions under $3,000 by having Blackbaud cover the costs, even if supporters choose not to contribute. With both options embedded directly into donation forms, organizations can reduce expenses, maximize net revenue, and build donor trust through greater transparency—all while redirecting more funding toward mission-critical work.
• Generative AI for Content Writer & Tone Enhancer for TeamRaiser (U.S. & Canada): With the power of generative AI directly embedded in TeamRaiser, peer-to-peer fundraising teams can use Blackbaud AI to craft coaching emails faster and with greater impact. This integrated tool generates personalized participant and team captain messages, adjusts tone to fit different audiences, and ensures consistent, high-quality outreach across campaigns. This capability will extend to Luminate Online in early 2026.  
• AI-Powered Online Giving Experience (Global): Users can simply ask Blackbaud AI to create donation forms, tailor forms to specific campaign requirements and generate Raiser’s Edge NXT lists of potential sustainer candidates for targeted outreach. In addition, Chat for Blackbaud AI can support performance analysis, peer benchmarking and feature enablement 

• Donor Portal: The Donor Portal will provide donors better access to their online data and impact as well as providing AI-powered recommendations for deeper involvement with constituents. When a donor gives, they’re welcomed into a personalized experience—one that reflects their interests, recognizes their impact, and invites them to stay engaged., Your donors can track their complete participation, see their influence grow, and get more connected to your mission. 

• A Growing Partner Ecosystem for Payments: Blackbaud Integrated Payments, the company’s expanded payment processing solution, is extending robust, purpose-built payments capabilities to a growing Partner ecosystem, simplifying the back office and enabling a more cohesive and seamless “Payments-as-a-Service” experience for customers. We also expanded Blackbaud Integrated Payments, made possible with SKY Payments API, to give you the power to choose from dozens of integrated partner solutions, offering capabilities like event ticketing, text-to-give, e-commerce, phonathons and more to simplify back-office processes without compromising the donor experience.    

• DAFPa : Created by Chariot, a 2024 Blackbaud Social Good Startup Program winner, this feature will be available to Blackbaud customers using our Online Giving and Luminate Online solutions in early 2026, enabling organizations to streamline the donor-advised fund (DAF) giving experience and easily accept DAF contributions online.

*Unless otherwise noted, features are slated for global availability.