Community sponsorship has become an increasingly popular instrument for setting up safe and legal pathways to protection in recent years. As part of its New Pact on Asylum and Migration, the European Commission now assumed ownership of the concept and called for a distinct “European model” of community sponsorship. However, the Commission remains vague as to what a European approach should look like. This policy brief analyses existing sponsorship schemes in EU member states and argues that a “European model” should be based on two principles: the additionality of sponsorship schemes and their focus on the protection of beneficiaries.