Members may affiliate with any or all of the eight Society Interest Groups. Groups are often subsets of Sections created to bring together members working on very specific areas of research. Groups may also represent cross-sectional concepts such as Translational Research.

Sections are APS Council-approved organizations composed of at least 100 Regular Society members who share a common interest.  Each member is asked to designate one primary and two secondary section affiliations. There are currently 12 Sections, each with their own internal governance, as outlined in the APS Statement of Organization and Procedures.