Opens to students October 30

Find your orbit.

Thousands of communities. Real conversation. People who are who they say they are. Download Orby now to hold your spot: students get in first, then everyone who verifies.

Download on theApp Store Check your email
Free · iOS 26 or later · No invite code needed
Live People joining Orby right now
Day 0 · Week 0 · Updated in real time
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joined today
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joined this week
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joined since launch
Next milestone250,000 on day one
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The product

Made for people, not the algorithm.

Every design decision in Orby starts from one question: does this make the conversation better? If it only makes the number go up, it doesn’t ship.

01 — COMMUNITIES

Communities that feel like home.

Over a hundred thousand communities, each with a purpose. Orbit the ones you care about and your feed is built from them, nothing else.

  • Every community can set its own rules and name its own moderators
  • Your feed is only what you orbit, in the order you choose
  • Leave any time; nothing follows you around
Suggested for you
o/astrophotography128,402 orbiters · 2,140 online
Orbiting
o/sourdough84,120 orbiters · 611 online
Orbit
o/nyc212,987 orbiters · 5,904 online
Orbit
o/mechkeyboards61,304 orbiters · 402 online
Orbit
4 friends orbit this
and 1,204 people from your school
02 — CONVERSATION

Threads worth reading to the end.

Replies are threaded, votes surface the best answer instead of the loudest one, and the person who asked can mark what actually helped. No autoplay, no infinite feed, no bait.

  • Sort any thread by best, newest, or most discussed
  • The original poster can pin the answer that worked
  • Load more when you want more, never by accident
Best267 replies
tomás_k· 4h
the crumb on this is unreal. what hydration are you at?
412Reply
maya.kOP· 3h
78%. and I finally stopped over-proofing.
96Reply
ren_· 2h
score at a 30° angle, one confident motion. changed everything for me.
41Reply
03 — TRUST

Moderation that’s actually there.

Automated screening catches the obvious, humans decide the rest, and any appeal a machine turns down can go to a person if you ask. Moderators get real tools, and every account belongs to a real, verified person.

  • Three tiers: automated screening, human review, and appeals
  • Mod queues with context, history, and one-tap actions
  • One person, one account, verified once
Mod queue · o/nyc 3
Spam3 reports · posted 12 min ago
RemoveKeep
HarassmentEscalated to Orby Trust & Safety
In review
Off-topic1 report · 41 min ago
RemoveKeep
Median time to first action this week: 41 min
Identity verifiedOne person, one account
Communities

106,538 orbits, and counting.

Seeded with purpose, and waiting for you. Whatever you’re into, you won’t be the first one there.

0
communities, seeded before launch
0
tiers of moderation: automated, human, appeal
0
of appeals a machine turns down can go to a person
0
account per person, verified once
The story

Four years in the making.

Orby was built slowly, on purpose. Here is how a deck and a prototype became the social network we wanted to exist.

  1. 2022

    The first check

    Sam Altman invested in Orby when it was a deck and a prototype. That check bought something rare in social software: four years to build without chasing a growth number.

  2. 2023

    A private alpha

    Two hundred people and one rule: conversation over engagement. Most of what they asked for is still in the app. Most of what we assumed is not.

  3. 2024

    Safety before scale

    We built the moderation stack first: automated screening, human review, and appeals that can reach a person. Moderators got real tools before we had real traffic.

  4. 2025

    The communities

    Over a hundred thousand communities seeded, each with a purpose, so that nobody ever arrives to an empty room.

  5. 2026

    Students first

    Orby opens to students on October 30, then to everyone who verifies who they are. No bots, no burner accounts. Just people, in good company.

I didn’t want to build the fastest-growing social network. I wanted to build the one people are still glad they joined ten years from now.
DDavis · Founder, Orby
Rollout

Students first. Then everyone, verified.

A social network is only as good as the people in it. So we’re opening the doors in order, and making sure everyone who walks through them is real.

Phase 1 · October 30

Students

Download Orby and sign up with your school email. Every current student with an active .edu address gets in on opening day, no invite code needed.

  • An active .edu address at a US college or university
  • Undergraduate or graduate, any year, any major
  • Alumni addresses (alum., alumni., alumnus. and the like) join in the general rollout

When do you get in?

Enter the email you’d sign up with to see which group you’re in. Then download Orby and sign up with it to hold your spot.

Nothing you type here is stored. It is only checked against the rule for each group. Privacy policy
FAQ

Questions, answered.

Anything else, email support@orbysocial.com. A human will reply.

Download Orby and sign up today to hold your spot. Current students with an active .edu address at a US college or university get in on October 30. Everyone else gets in during the general rollout later this year, and more countries follow.

No. There are no invite codes. Sign up in the app, and Orby opens on its own when it’s your group’s turn. Turn on notifications and we’ll tell you the moment it does.

Not on October 30. Alumni addresses such as alumni.school.edu or alum.school.edu belong to people who have graduated, and the first opening is for people on campus now. That goes for every alumni variant: alum., alumni., alumnus., alumnae. and the like, at any school. Download Orby and sign up now to hold your spot; you’ll get in with the general rollout, and we’ll notify you in the app.

Yes. Download Orby and sign up with any email. You’ll be on the waitlist, and we’ll send one notification when Orby opens to everyone. If you turn notifications off, we’ll email you instead.

A one-time check that you’re a real person: a government ID and a quick selfie, handled by a verification partner. Orby keeps a yes or no, not your documents, and never shows your legal name unless you choose to.

Yes. Orby is free, and there are no ads during the rollout. An optional Premium tier comes later, with extras that never gate the conversation itself.

After the general rollout. iPhone first, then iPad, Android, and the web, in that order.

No. We don’t sell personal data, and we don’t track you across other apps and websites. The privacy policy says so in plain language, and it’s short enough to read.

Get Orby.

Free on iPhone. Sign up now; students get in on October 30.

Download on theApp Store