Scientific conferences are an important part of scientific infrastructure. Their design and organization influence whom we meet, which research we discover, how early-career scientists can engage with established researchers, and ultimately how knowledge is shared within our community.

The EGU General Assembly has evolved over the years, introducing new presentation formats, digital tools, hybrid participation, and increasingly diverse opportunities for scientific interaction. However, the scale of the meeting creates challenges and raises questions about how the conference experience could be improved.

For instance:
-What lessons can be drawn from other conferences and experimental formats?
-How could the overall programme structure be optimized to reduce fragmentation and overlaps?
-How might navigation and orientation throughout the conference be improved?
-Can participants be encouraged to engage with research beyond their immediate scientific fields and foster interdisciplinary collaboration?
-How can we better support “opportunistic” participation, where attendees spontaneously join sessions, and what implications would this have for scheduling, signage, and session design?
-How can different presentation formats be better balanced, and which alternative formats could foster deeper scientific discussion?
-How could poster sessions be organized to better support interaction and exchange? Could alternative organization, structure, and timing be explored?
-How can networking and informal exchange be supported, especially for early-career participants?
-How can the conference support inclusivity and accessibility for a diverse community, including hybrid participants?
-How can participant feedback be integrated into future changes?

We invite contributions from across the EGU community, including quantitative analyses, surveys, experiments, comparisons with other conferences, experience reports, prototypes, and unconventional ideas.

We particularly encourage contributions that go beyond identifying problems and instead propose or evaluate possible solutions. The session aims to create a space for structured discussion among participants, going beyond a traditional sequence of presentations, and to collect concrete proposals emerging from the community.

We believe that our collective experience of the EGU General Assembly provides a valuable basis for exploring how future meetings can foster better scientific exchange, discovery, and collaboration.