Free to support
Rewilding & conservation
Mossy Earth
Help restore wild ecosystems and protect biodiversity. Your background activity can support Mossy Earth’s conservation projects.
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PLANT TREES
FOR FREE WHILE
YOU USE YOUR
COMPUTER
IdleForest is a free desktop app and Chrome extension that turns unused internet bandwidth into funding for verified tree planting. Install it once and let it run while you use your computer. The desktop app works even with your browser closed.
Chrome Web Store
Featured as a free tree planting extension.
4.8 Star Rating
Rated by the IdleForest community across 33 reviews.
Verified Impact
Verified tree planting funded by unused bandwidth.
Partner projects
Meet the projects you can support with IdleForest.
Choose a cause you care about. Join its page, install IdleForest, and help fund the work while you use your computer.
Free to support
Free to support
Ocean & plastic recovery
Waste Free Planet
Help keep plastic out of the ocean. Support collection work through Waste Free Planet, 1ClickImpact, and Plastic Bank.
Free to support
Village & forest regeneration
Silveira Tech
Help bring a Portuguese mountain village back to life. Support native forests, biodiversity, and regeneration in Serra da LousĂŁ.
Verified Impact
Verified tree-planting partners
We fund reforestation through trusted partners with published planting records, traceable receipts, and projects chosen for carbon, biodiversity, and community impact.
Kisumu 7 - Awach
Trees for the Future helps smallholder farmers build food forests that restore soil, capture carbon, and create long-term local income.
466
Trees planted
Trees for the Future
Kisumu, Kenya
Agroforestry and long-term land restoration
Busoga 5 - Buwaiswa
Our latest 1ClickImpact certificate funds 3,000 trees with Trees for the Future in Buwaiswa, Uganda.
3,000
Trees planted
Trees for the Future
Buwaiswa, Uganda
Food forests and farmer-led restoration
Replanting the burnt Mkussu Forest
Tree-Nation supports native forest recovery in Tanzania, prioritizing local species and long-term ecological value over monoculture planting.
400
Trees planted
Tree-Nation
Lushoto District, Tanzania
Native forest recovery after wildfire
Trees for the Future
Trees for the Future plants food forests with smallholder farmers across Sub-Saharan Africa. Their Forest Garden model trains farmers to grow trees, vegetables, and cash crops on the same land, restoring soil while supporting long-term local income.
Visit their site
Tree-Nation
Tree-Nation restores native forests in 35+ countries, including Madagascar, Senegal, and Tanzania. They focus on species native to each region, which gives planted forests stronger survival rates and better long-term ecological value than monoculture planting.
Visit their site
1ClickImpact
1ClickImpact funds planting projects with traceability across certificates, project records, and impact reporting. We link their verified planting records in our transparency work so you can follow where funded trees go.
Visit their site5,364 trees planted by our community
How the tree planting app works
Install IdleForest once. Use your computer as usual. Your unused internet bandwidth funds verified tree planting in the background.
1.
Install in One Click
Add IdleForest to Chrome from the Web Store, or download the desktop app for Mac, Windows, or Linux. No signup, payment method, or browser-setting changes required. Learn more about the Chrome extension.
2.
Use Your Computer as Usual
The desktop app runs in the background while your computer is on and connected to the internet, even with your browser closed. The Chrome extension works while your browser is open. Both use unused bandwidth to help fund trees. Read the full technical explanation
3.
Watch Your Forest Grow
Every gigabyte of idle bandwidth generates revenue that funds tree planting with partners like Trees for the Future, Tree-Nation, and 1ClickImpact.
Idle bandwidth is the part of your internet connection you are not using. Most of the time, your connection sits at a small fraction of its capacity. The rest is wasted.
IdleForest puts that unused capacity to work. The app routes small data tasks through your connection, like checking website uptime or running market research queries. These tasks are sessionless: they do not carry personal data, cookies, or browsing history.
Clients pay for those tasks. We take that revenue and send it to our reforestation partners. The result: you plant trees with bandwidth you were not using anyway. The cost to you is zero.
This model is why IdleForest is free. We do not need your money, your search history, or your email. We just need the gigabytes you would have wasted.
Start planting trees in 10 seconds
Install IdleForest, use your computer as usual, and let unused internet bandwidth fund verified reforestation. The desktop app works in the background, even with your browser closed.
WINDOWS
Download IdleForest for Windows and plant trees with idle bandwidth while your computer is on.
Download for WindowsLINUX
Download the 64-bit .deb package for Linux and fund verified reforestation in the background.
Download for LinuxMAC OS
Download IdleForest for macOS and contribute to verified reforestation while your computer is idle.
Download for Mac OS
Our Impact
5,364
TREES TO BE PLANTED
10.1M
TOTAL REQUESTS
1,000+
ACTIVE USERS
$2,796
TOTAL CONTRIBUTIONS
04Team
Meet the team
The people building IdleForest and turning idle internet into real reforestation work.
Join 1,000+ Users Funding Trees with IdleForest
See what the community is saying about IdleForest on the Chrome Web Store.
What we achieved
& where we're heading
BROWSER EXTENSION
COMPLETEDLaunched our flagship browser extensions for Chrome and Edge. This key milestone allows users to seamlessly contribute to reforestation during their daily browsing, making eco-friendly actions more accessible.
DESKTOP APP
BETAOur desktop application expands Idleforest beyond the browser, enabling contributions even when you're not actively browsing.
REFERRAL SYSTEM
IN DEVInvite friends and businesses to multiply impact. Earn bonus trees for successful referrals and help grow the forest faster.
MOBILE APP
PLANNEDBring Idleforest to iOS and Android so you can contribute on the go with smart, energy‑efficient usage.
CORPORATE IMPACT CERTIFICATION
PLANNEDA verification program for companies to certify and showcase their environmental contributions powered by Idleforest.
Frequently Asked Questions
Got questions? We've got answers. Learn more about how IdleForest works and what to expect.
Yes. There is no subscription, no donation, no signup, and no paid tier. IdleForest is funded by revenue from idle bandwidth tasks, not by you.
No. IdleForest uses only the bandwidth you are not using. When you start a video call, open a heavy site, or download a file, IdleForest steps back.
You can also pause it at any time from the extension menu.
The app uses your unused internet bandwidth to power small backend tasks for paying clients. Revenue from those tasks funds tree planting with partners like Trees for the Future, Tree-Nation, and 1ClickImpact.
You can see the live count of trees funded on our transparency page.
Idle bandwidth is the part of your internet connection that is not being used. Most home connections sit below their full capacity most of the time.
IdleForest uses that unused capacity to generate revenue, then routes that revenue to verified reforestation.
Yes. IdleForest does not change how you browse or what search engine you use. It works alongside Ecosia, Brave, Chrome, and Edge.
You can stack the impact from IdleForest with other environmentally focused tools.
None of your personal browsing data. The traffic that runs through IdleForest is sessionless, meaning it does not carry cookies, personal identifiers, or browsing history.
The app does not read your tabs, bookmarks, or search history. See our privacy policy for the full breakdown.
No. Tasks are limited to uptime monitoring, market research, and similar passive data collection from public sites.
IdleForest does not participate in ad fraud, crypto mining, scraping private data, or malicious activity. We publish more detail in our transparency report.
IdleForest has funded 5,364 trees through our partners. We update the monthly total on the transparency report as new partner records are added.
See the transparency report for the latest breakdown by partner and region.
Active desktop users usually generate around $2-$5 per month, depending on location, how often the app is running, and how much spare capacity is available. One person's contribution is modest, but across a community it becomes steady funding for verified trees.
The more users join, the more idle bandwidth becomes available, and the more trees can be funded.
Not yet. IdleForest runs as a Chrome extension and as a desktop app for Mac, Windows, and Linux.
Mobile is on the roadmap, but mobile networks usually have less idle bandwidth than home connections, so the impact per user would be lower. We will launch when the math works.
Yes. Remove the Chrome extension from your extensions menu, or uninstall the desktop app like any other application.
Once uninstalled, no bandwidth is used and no data is collected. The trees you have already helped fund stay funded.
IdleForest is a browser extension and desktop app for reforestation. Not associated with the "Idle Forest" mobile game.
Start Planting Trees in 10 Seconds
Install IdleForest. Use your computer as usual. Help fund verified trees.