Bloomsbury blog How to find New Zealand charities aligned with your values

Bloomsbury blog post, 19 September 2026

Bloomsbury Associates have launched a new tool to connect donors with the causes they care about. The NZ Charity Explorer is a simple search engine to help donors unlock the Charities Register, find charities aligned with their values, and start giving.

Answering the third question

Earlier this year, we launched The Giving Gauge to answer the two most common questions we get from people curious about giving:

How much can I afford to give?
Can I start giving now?

The Giving Gauge has helped users get these answers, and we hope after using the tool they feel more confident about their capacity to give and their ability to bring their giving forward.

To date, 79% of Giving Gauge users have found that they can afford to start giving now and the estimated median giving budget is approximately $47,000 per year.

Now, armed with their Giving Gauge results, some users have a third question:

How do I find a charity to give to?

That's why we're launching the NZ Charity Explorer.

Why finding a charity is harder than it sounds

Donors have told us that the Charities Register is hard to navigate, even when you have a particular charity in mind, let alone when you're trying to scout for charities that align with your values.

We recently built a searchable list of charities eligible for philanthropic investment under the Active Investor Plus (AIP) visa scheme. But we realised that it isn't just AIP applicants facing this problem – New Zealand donors want help unlocking the Charities Register too. So we've expanded the tool to include all 29,000 registered charities.

We've also added more search filters and analysis of Register data, to help donors find the information they need to start giving.

How Charity Explorer helps donors find charities aligned with their values

The NZ Charity Register Explorer is a simple search engine, using official data from the Charities Register, to help donors find charities aligned with their values.

With NZ Charity Register Explorer, donors can search across different dimensions, including a charity's purpose, region, and trustees, to identify potential charities that align with your values and support the causes you care about.

NZ Charity Explorer lets you identify:

charities that have a charitable purpose aligned with your philanthropic goals
charities that operate locally, in your region or community
who the trustees are for your chosen charities
which charities your social network are working with
charities that operate in developing nations or in response to specific international emergencies
charities that are faith-based, with belief that match your religious values.

However you want to give, you can find the right charity with NZ Charity Explorer.

Try NZ Charity Explorer now.

More resources

Haven't tried The Giving Gauge yet? Try it now.

Working with AIP applicants? Try our NZ AIP Charity List.