Alcoholics Anonymous Meetings Are Held Every Day In Virtual Spaces

Recovering alcoholics are finding regular meeting spaces in VR.

Horizon Worlds, VRChat, and even Resonite are host to regular Alcoholics Anonymous meetings where people meet to discuss their "problem with alcohol" and seek sobriety.

Physical meeting spaces already offer a sense of anonymity in the loosely-organized AA network, which has grown its membership under the principle "anonymity has proved one of the greatest gifts that A.A. offers the suffering alcoholic. Without it, many would never attend their first meeting."

Attending an AA meeting in VR, meanwhile, means a "suffering alcoholic" doesn't even need to show their face to another person in order "to do something about their drinking problem."

One organizer of many of the meetings in VR suggests hundreds of people have been put on the road to recovery from their attendance to these meetings, from among thousands attending the sessions over the last five years.

"Virtual AA meetings began in AltspaceVR in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic, providing a much-needed space for connection and recovery when in-person meetings were shut down. Around the same time, meetings also started in Horizon Worlds," the organizer wrote to me. "After Altspace was shut down, the meetings transitioned to VRChat, where the community has continued to grow. There have also been efforts to establish meetings in other platforms. More recently, a new meeting has started in Resonite, signaling continued interest and experimentation with different VR platforms to support sobriety and fellowship in immersive spaces."

In the interests of respecting the privacy of those involved, which is the guiding principle of the Alcoholics Anonymous network, I've chosen not to identify my source for this particular article. That said, we're interested in writing about those who've found anything of meaning through their time spent in headset, and you can reach out if you'd like to share something. Our comments section below is also free and open to anyone who wants to share.

Here's the current schedule of where you can look online for meetings in VR. I'm not linking to them directly to avoid sending absolutely everyone in the direction of these spaces right from this page. If you're looking for these groups, you can find them by searching the respective platform at the listed time.

• Monday 8 pm ET - The Friends of Bill W Center - Horizon Worlds
• Tuesday 8 pm ET - We Agnostics World - VRChat
• Wednesday 2 pm ET - The Friends of Bill W Center - Horizon Worlds
• Thursday 10 pm ET - The Friends of Bill W Center - Horizon Worlds
• Friday 8.30 pm ET - AA Resonite Recovery - Resonite
• Saturday 8 pm ET - AA World - VRChat
• Sunday 5.30 pm ET - We Agnostics - VRChat