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Insect species are responding to human-caused global changes, sparking an urgent need for more conservation and management. Recent publications indicate the speed and scale of these changes to be both fast and large, impacting ecosystem function and human health. Community scientists are contributing vast amounts of data on insect occurrence and abundance to publicly available biodiversity platforms. These data are then used by ecologists to estimate insect diversity and distributions and forecast species' responses to the stressors of the Anthropocene. Yet, challenges remain with taxonomy, species identification, and sampling, some of which can be improved by new tools and approaches. Here we review the open, global community science programs providing the majority of publicly available insect data. We explore the advantages, challenges, and next steps with these large-scale community science ventures, emphasizing the importance of collaboration between professionals and community scientists to jointly address the conservation of insects., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest KLP declares she has a personal and professional relationship with eButterfly as part of the original development and implementation team. All authors have used the community science software applications discussed and community science data in both their research and personal recreation. The findings and conclusions in this article are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the views of the Desert Botanical Garden, Tucson Audubon Society, or the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)