Learn More About Meetings

Attend an AA Meeting

Anyone with a desire to stop drinking is welcome, regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, income, or profession.

You can just sit and listen and learn more about recovery, or you can share about your situation. It’s completely up to you.

Find A Meeting Near You

What to Expect at an AA Meeting

There are a variety of formats for AA meetings and each meeting takes on the feel of their local area. At most meetings you will hear members talk about how their drinking affected them and those around them. Many also share what actions they took to stop drinking, what their lives are like today, and how they stay sober through the ups and downs of life.

Meeting Types

AA meetings are typically listed as “open” or “closed” meetings.

Open meetings are available to anyone interested in Alcoholics Anonymous’s program of recovery from alcoholism. Nonalcoholics, such as family members or friends of an alcoholic, may attend open meetings as observers.

Closed meetings are for AA members only or for those who have a drinking problem and “have a desire to stop drinking.”

At both types of meetings, it may be requested that participants confine their discussion to matters pertaining to recovery from alcoholism.

Whether open or closed, AA meetings are conducted by AA members who determine the format of their meetings.

Meeting Locations

AA meetings are held in-person, online, or on the telephone. The members of each meeting decide when, where, and how often they will meet.

In-person meetings take place in a variety of places – wherever a room can be rented. Meetings occur in office buildings, churches, treatment centers, community centers, and in buildings dedicated to recovery, such as clubhouses. You can even find meetings on beaches, in parks, and on mountain tops.

Online and telephone meetings are also available. Various platforms are used depending on what the group members prefer. Some are video meetings where you see each other’s faces. At other online meetings, everyone’s video is off. Still other meetings use a dial-in conference call number.

Common Meeting Formats

Discussion: Whether closed or open, an AA member serving as “leader” or “chair” opens the meeting using that group’s format, and selects a topic for discussion. Many topic meetings derive from AA literature, such as Alcoholics Anonymous (the Big Book), Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, As Bill Sees It, Daily Reflections, and from AA Grapevine.

Speaker: One or more members selected beforehand “share” — as described in the Big Book — telling “what we were like, what happened, and what we are like now.” Depending on the meeting’s general guidelines (determined by the “group conscience”), some groups prefer that members who speak have a minimum period of continuous sobriety. Speaker meetings often are open meetings.

Beginners: Usually led by a group member who has been sober awhile, these are sessions to help newcomers. Beginners meetings may also follow a discussion format, or focus on Steps One, Two and Three.

Step, Tradition or Big Book: Because the Twelve Steps are the foundation of personal recovery in AA, many groups devote one or more meetings a week to the study of each Step in rotation; some discuss two or three Steps at a time. These same formats may be applied to group meetings on the Big Book or the Twelve Traditions. Many groups make it a practice to read aloud material from the Big Book or Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions at the beginning of the meeting.

What Happens at Meetings

The chair usually opens the meeting with the AA Preamble and a few remarks. Some call for a moment of silence and/or recite the Serenity Prayer. The chair will often ask if there are any people new to AA attending the meeting who would like to introduce themselves. It isn’t mandatory to identify yourself, but it might be helpful if you are attending your first meeting. Many meetings begin with a reading from the Big Book — frequently a portion of Chapter 5 (“How It Works”) or Chapter 3 (“More About Alcoholism”).

A statement about anonymity in AA as a valuable privacy principle for new and longtime members might be read. Many meetings close with members joining in a moment of silence followed by a prayer, or perhaps by reciting the Responsibility Statement or other AA text.

After the Meeting

People gather and talk, and there is a social air in the room once the meeting is over. Some may introduce themselves to you and offer their help or share their experiences getting sober. While many members find this time after the meeting valuable, it is up to you if you want to stay and socialize.

If You are Referred to AA by the Court or a Treatment Facility

AA welcomes attendees from court programs and treatment facilities. The strength of our program lies in the voluntary nature of membership in AA; however, many of us first attended meetings because we were pressured to by someone else. Continual exposure to AA educated us about the true nature of alcoholism.

Who made the referral to A.A. is not what AA is interested in. It is the problem drinker who is our concern. We cannot predict who will recover, nor have we the authority to decide how recovery should be sought by any other alcoholic.

Does AA provide Proof of Attendance?

Sometimes a referral source like a court or a treatment center will ask that you get proof of attendance at AA meetings. Most groups are willing to accommodate proof of attendance, but there is no set procedure. The nature and extent of any group’s involvement is entirely up to the individual group.

Some groups, with the consent of the prospective member, have an AA member acknowledge attendance. This may be provided on a slip that has been furnished by the referral source, or via a digital method if the group is online. The referred person is responsible for returning the proof of attendance.

Proof of attendance at meetings is not part of AA’s procedure as a whole. Each group is autonomous and has the right to choose whether or not to provide proof of attendance at their meeting. We suggest asking someone at the meetings you attend.