# Recommending and sharing content

On ResearchGate, you have two primary ways to connect your peers with high-quality research: recommending it publicly or sharing it privately.

* **Recommend:** This is a public action. It helps your peers and network discover valuable research.
* **Share:** This is a private action. It allows you to send a research item directly to specific colleagues or groups for private discussion.

You might recommend or share a research item for these reasons:

* To highlight important or cutting-edge research.
* To keep your network updated on relevant research in your field.
* To start a discussion with peers or colleagues.
* To share your own work with your professional network.

#### What you can recommend

You can recommend any research item you believe is valuable to the community, including:

* Articles, preprints, and conference papers
* Questions and answers

#### How to recommend a research item 

**Follow these steps to publicly recommend a publication or preprint:**

1. Go to the research item's page.
2. Click the **More** button located under the statistics on the right-hand side of the page.
3. Select **Recommend publicly** from the menu.

**To recommend a question or answer:**

* Simply click the **Recommend** button that appears directly below the question or answer.

**To remove your recommendation:**

Follow the steps above and click the button again, which will now show as **Recommended**.

#### Understanding recommendations

Recommendations are public on ResearchGate:

* Your network is notified and will see your recommendation appear in their activity feed.
* Other researchers will see that you have recommended the item when they visit its page.

#### How to share a research item

If you want to share a research item with a select person or group privately, follow these steps:

1. Go to the research item's page.
2. Click the **Share** button located under the statistics on the right-hand side of the page.
3. Choose how you want to share: Select **Share on Twitter** or **Share as a message**.
4. Enter the recipient(s): Type the names of the researchers you want to share with, or select them from the suggestions.
5. Click **Share**.

Important Note on private messages: You can only share a research item via private message with researchers who are already in your network.

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