diff --git a/CONTRIBUTING.md b/CONTRIBUTING.md
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..860c53e4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/CONTRIBUTING.md
@@ -0,0 +1,65 @@
+# Contributing to `wasmtime-py`
+
+`wasmtime-py` is a [Bytecode Alliance] project. It follows the Bytecode
+Alliance's [Code of Conduct] and [Organizational Code of Conduct].
+
+So far this extension has been written by folks who are primarily Rust
+programmers, so feel free to create a PR to help make things more idiomatic if
+you see something!
+
+## Set Up
+
+You'll need to acquire a [Wasmtime] installation. The `wasmtime-py` package
+expects your platform's shared library to exist at `wasmtime/{host}/_{library}`.
+You can download the latest development version of Wasmtime by running a script
+in the top-level directory of the package's source (this is what CI does):
+
+[wasmtime]: https://wasmtime.dev/
+
+```sh
+$ python download-wasmtime.py
+```
+
+Otherwise if you have a local checkout of Wasmtime you can symlink its
+`libwasmtime.so` (or equivalent) to `wasmtime/linux-x86_64/_libwasmtime.so` (or
+equivalent).
+
+Finally, install the dev dependencies with `pip`:
+
+```
+$ pip install -e ".[testing]"
+```
+
+## Testing
+
+After you've completed the set up steps, you can run the tests locally with
+`pytest`:
+
+```
+$ pytest
+```
+
+### CI and Releases
+
+The CI for this project does a few different things:
+
+* API docs are generated for pushes to the `main` branch and are [published
+  online][apidoc].
+
+* Test coverage information is generated for pushes to the `main` branch and are
+  [available online](https://bytecodealliance.github.io/wasmtime-py/coverage/).
+
+* Each push to `main` will publish a release to
+  [test.pypi.org](https://test.pypi.org/project/wasmtime/) for local inspection.
+
+* Tagged commits will automatically be published to
+  [pypi.org](https://pypi.org/project/wasmtime/).
+
+All commits/PRs run the full test suite, and check for code style
+and other errors using [flake8](https://flake8.pycqa.org/).
+
+[Bytecode Alliance]: https://bytecodealliance.org/
+[Code of Conduct]: CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md
+[Organizational Code of Conduct]: ORG_CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md
+[Wasmtime]: https://github.com/bytecodealliance/wasmtime
+[apidoc]: https://bytecodealliance.github.io/wasmtime-py/
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index fb9ceca7..8a27c223 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -30,7 +30,7 @@
 
 ## Installation
 
-To install wasmtime-py, run this command in your terminal:
+To install `wasmtime-py`, run this command in your terminal:
 
 ```bash
 $ pip install wasmtime
@@ -85,54 +85,4 @@ print(your_wasm_file.run())
 
 ## Contributing
 
-So far this extension has been written by folks who are primarily Rust
-programmers, so it's highly likely that there's some faux pas in terms of Python
-idioms. Feel free to create a PR to help make things more idiomatic
-if you see something!
-
-To work on this extension locally you'll first want to clone the project:
-
-```sh
-$ git clone https://github.com/bytecodealliance/wasmtime-py
-$ cd wasmtime-py
-```
-
-Next up you'll acquire a [Wasmtime] installation. The wasmtime-py package expects
-your platform's shared library to exist at `wasmtime/wasmtime.pyd`. You can
-download the latest development version of Wasmtime by running a script in the
-top-level directory of the package's source (this is what CI does):
-
-[wasmtime]: https://wasmtime.dev/
-
-```sh
-$ python download-wasmtime.py
-```
-
-Otherwise if you have a local checkout of Wasmtime you can symlink
-its `libwasmtime.so` (or equivalent) to `wasmtime/wasmtime.pyd`.
-
-After you've got Wasmtime set up you can check it works by running all the
-unit tests:
-
-```sh
-$ pip install pytest
-$ pytest
-```
-
-After that you should be good to go!
-
-### CI and Releases
-
-The CI for this project does a few different things:
-
-* API docs are generated for pushes to the `main` branch and are [published
-    online][apidoc].
-* Test coverage information is generated for pushes to the `main` branch and are
-  [available online](https://bytecodealliance.github.io/wasmtime-py/coverage/).
-* Each push to `main` will publish a release to
-  [test.pypi.org](https://test.pypi.org/project/wasmtime/) for local inspection.
-* Tagged commits will automatically be published to
-  [pypi.org](https://pypi.org/project/wasmtime/).
-
-All commits/PRs run the full test suite, and check for code style
-and other errors using [flake8](https://flake8.pycqa.org/).
+See [`CONTRIBUTING.md`](./CONTRIBUTING.md).