The EurIPS AI conference was launched in 2025 as an experiment to strengthen the European research community in artificial intelligence. Held in parallel with the world’s largest AI conference, NeurIPS in San Diego, EurIPS brought more than 2,000 researchers to Copenhagen. EurIPS brought more than 2,000 researchers to Copenhagen
The event gave European researchers the chance to meet in person and present their NeurIPS papers at EurIPS in Copenhagen instead of travelling across the Atlantic.
NeurIPS remains a key meeting point for academia and industry, where knowledge is shared, companies recruit new talent, and many start-ups secure funding. EurIPS provided a European setting for the same dynamic.
But what happens next year? Will there be another EurIPS? Or should a new, independent European meeting be created?
Collaboration, Climate, European sovereignty
On the final day, a panel explored these questions without reaching firm conclusions. Much depends on whether NeurIPS considers integrating the European initiative.
Through Mentimeter.com, the audience shared their views via real-time voting on why they attended the European conference. The strongest motivation (20%) was European collaboration, followed by climate considerations and European sovereignty (15% each), closely trailed by a preference for smaller events (14%). These responses were discussed live on stage.
After the debate, Professor Søren Hauberg of DTU Compute and one of the initiators, was in no doubt: there is overwhelming interest in meeting on European soil.
Workshops exceeded all expectations
Organised in just a few months, EurIPS quickly sold out.
Even more remarkable was the response when EurIPS opened for workshop proposals: hundreds of submissions and 50 workshop ideas.
“Back in summer, the conference was still a secret, and we thought we might manage four workshops. Yet we ended up with almost 600 posters across 18 workshops. People had only a month to write and submit papers, but the response was massive,” says Søren Hauberg.
One of the other organisers, Professor Aasa Feragen of DTU Compute, adds:
“It is incredibly exciting to try to build a broader research community. Many researchers simply want places to meet in Europe. There are some options already, but they quickly become chaotic. We need a summit-style format, and this is probably the best for now. It’s fantastic to see such strong engagement.”
The timing is prefect
Now the question is what happens next year. Whatever the outcome, the interest in meeting across Europe is undeniable.
Søren Hauberg hopes a decision can be made soon so planning can begin.
“The response is a huge vote of confidence from the research community, but timing has also been crucial. We could have launched many different versions of EurIPS, and they would all have succeeded because the timing right now is perfect.”
While EurIPS was taking place in Copenhagen, four researchers from DTU Compute (three PhD students Anders Gjølbye Madsen, Rasmus H. Tirsgaard, and Laurits Fredsgaard, and Postdoc Samuel Matthiesen, had travelled to San Diego in the US to present their work at NeurIPS. Explore the gallery with photos from EurIPS and NeurIPS.
