SIAM is the world's largest scientific society devoted to applied mathematics, and roughly two-thirds of its membership resides within the United States.

[3] Founded in 1951,[4] the organization began holding annual national meetings in 1954,[5][6] and now hosts conferences, publishes books and scholarly journals, and engages in advocacy in issues of interest to its membership.

Charter approval is largely based on group size, as topics that were considered hot at one time may have fewer active researchers later.

In particular, SIAM distributes books produced by Gilbert Strang's Wellesley-Cambridge Press, such as his Introduction to Linear Algebra (5th edition, 2016).

Organizations such as libraries can obtain DRM-free access to SIAM books in eBook format for a subscription fee.

[21] SIAM organizes conferences and meetings throughout the year focused on various topics in applied math and computational science.

[22] The establishment of the SIAM Conferences on Discrete Mathematics, held every two years, has been regarded as a sign of the growth of graph theory as a prominent topic of study.