Welcome to the Rust Innovation Lab.
Guided by Rust values. Designed for your project’s success — The Rust Innovation Lab is the Rust Foundation’s home for projects that power critical infrastructure—providing trusted support, stability, and space to grow.
As the most impactful Rust projects evolve into essential infrastructure for the ecosystem, the Rust Innovation Lab (RIL) provides fiscal stewardship, governance, and administrative support for fully funded initiatives, helping them thrive while safeguarding their independence and vision.
Through the Rust Innovation Lab, funded projects gain the strength of a neutral nonprofit organization, expert guidance, and access to the wider Rust ecosystem. Together, the Rust Foundation and projects hosted through the Rust Innovation Lab can ensure that key Rust tools and efforts remain secure, sustainable, and independent for the long term.
The Rust Innovation Lab is just getting started. Stay tuned for more information, resources, case studies, and stories about the Foundation’s hosted projects.
The Rust Innovation Lab Advantage
Open source isn’t just about code—it’s about people, knowledge-sharing, and collaboration. At the Rust Foundation, we believe that when maintainers and their projects are supported, the entire ecosystem benefits. The Rust Innovation Lab was created to provide that support. Here’s what hosted projects will gain from the Rust Foundation as this program evolves…
A Stable, Neutral Home
The Rust Foundation is an independent nonprofit dedicated to stewarding the Rust Programming Language. Hosting your project with us ensures that it is supported by transparent governance and vendor-neutral backing, building confidence among contributors, partners, and users.
Governance Support
As projects grow, so do questions about leadership, decision-making, and sustainability. Innovation Lab projects receive guidance to set up structures that keep momentum strong while protecting long-term health.
Legal & Administrative Confidence
Open source shouldn’t mean facing complex legal and administrative challenges alone. We help projects navigate licensing, contributor agreements, and related issues with clarity and confidence.
Community & Visibility
Through the Rust Innovation Lab, projects gain visibility across the Rust ecosystem, increasing their ability to attract contributors, partners, and financial support. Participants also benefit from peer networking opportunities to share hard-earned lessons and best practices.
Fiscal Sponsorship
The Rust Foundation functions as the fiscal sponsor of all projects in the Rust Innovation Lab. Through this role, we can accept donations, grants, and sponsorships on your behalf under our nonprofit status. This means you don't need to create a separate legal entity or open a bank account or handle taxes. All the while, incoming funds will be earmarked for your project.
Our team will keep clear records and provide reporting so funders know where their money is going, and you know what’s available. This allows you to build trust with sponsors, contributors, and your community while focusing on what matters to you: the code.
The Rust Foundation does not provide fiscal support to hosted projects through our core funds.
Our First Rust Innovation Lab Project: Rustls
The inaugural Rust Innovation Lab project is Rustls, a memory-safe, high-performance TLS library that is by far the most popular way to build secure connections in the Rust ecosystem and is one of the top 100 packages on crates.io. Click on their logo to learn more.
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Rustls is a memory-safe, high-performance, and flexible TLS library. Since it is implemented in a memory-safe language, Rustls does not suffer from the most dangerous class of vulnerabilities affecting implementations in C or C++. Swappable cryptography, support for external QUIC implementations, and multiple ways to integrate with C programs make Rustls one of the most flexible TLS implementations available.
"We are excited by the opportunities to sustain and support the long-term development and maintenance of Rustls as a part of the Rust Innovation Lab. We look forward to working with the Rust Foundation toward these goals."
- Joseph Birr-Pixton, Founder of Rustls