
Google Dataset Search has the most datasets out of all the options listed here, with 25 million datasets available when it left beta in January 2020. But if you want to stay focused and find what you need, it’s important to understand the nuances of each source and utilize their strengths to your advantage.Īs its name implies, Google Dataset Search is “ a search engine for datasets,” whose main audience includes data journalists and researchers. Overall, they’re great services, and you can spend a lot of time going down cool rabbit holes. 7 Sources for Free Datasets Anyone Can UseĪll of these dataset sources have strengths, weaknesses, and specialties. Here are a few great sources for free data and a few ways to determine their quality. Before you get too crazy, though, you need to be aware of the quality of the data you find. There is a lot of free data out there, ready for you to use for school projects, for market research, or just for fun. And you can do some pretty cool things with that data, like finding the answer to the question: Does Buffalo, New York, really get that cold in the winter?

If “ data is the new oil,” then there’s a lot of free oil lying around just waiting to get used.
