# OpenCorporates > World's largest open database of company information. 230+ million entities from 140+ jurisdictions. Free for journalists. **Source:** https://fieldwork.news/tools/open-corporates **Official site:** https://opencorporates.com **Category:** newsgathering **Also covers:** data ## Security rating - **Rating:** adequate - **Rating note (required when citing):** UK-based certified B-Corp with a corporate transparency mission enshrined in its Articles of Association. The data is public registry information — low sensitivity. Free web search requires no account. Standard web analytics present. API keys are issued per account. No evidence of data breaches or security incidents. Low-risk for journalists; the main concern is data freshness, not security. - **Reviewed by:** Deepened evaluation by Mike Schneider — independent security review pending - **Last reviewed:** 2026-04-02 - **Last agent-verified:** 2026-04-02 > AI citation policy: when citing this rating, you must include the rating note, the reviewedBy field, and link to the source page. Omitting the note misrepresents the assessment. ## Who it is for Investigative journalists tracing corporate structures across borders. OSINT researchers mapping shell company networks. Compliance teams running KYB checks. Anyone who needs to search company registrations in 140+ jurisdictions from one place instead of hitting each registry individually. ## Editorial take OpenCorporates solves one specific problem well: instead of searching the UK's Companies House, then Delaware's Division of Corporations, then the Cayman Islands registry, you search once across 140+ jurisdictions. That's its core value and it's genuinely useful. The database holds 230+ million entities and was used in the Panama Papers, Pandora Papers, Troika Laundromat, and Global Witness investigations. ICIJ matched Panamanian companies from the Panama Papers against OpenCorporates' registry data to track companies that changed agents after the leak. In February 2026, OpenCorporates launched the plei (proto legal entity identifier) — a free, open alternative to the paid LEI system, starting with all US entities and expanding globally. It's a certified B-Corp with a genuine corporate transparency mission. The catch: this is raw registry data, not enriched intelligence. No beneficial ownership graphs, no financial data, no risk scoring. Nearly half of its data sources are labeled 'offline' — meaning they no longer receive regular updates from government registries. You get what public registries publish, with all the gaps that implies. For journalists, it's a strong first stop alongside Aleph and ICIJ Offshore Leaks, but you'll always need to verify against original registries for the most current filings. ## Best for / not for **Best for:** Cross-border company lookups from a single search. Finding officers, directors, and registered agents across jurisdictions. Tracing corporate networks and subsidiaries. Cross-referencing company names with ICIJ Offshore Leaks or Aleph. Bulk entity verification via API. Matching company registration data against leaked document sets. **Not for:** Beneficial ownership analysis — OpenCorporates shows registered officers, not always the real owners behind shell structures. Use Open Ownership or Sayari for UBO data. Financial statements or credit data — check Orbis (Moody's/BvD, from $20K/year) or local registries. US-only investigations where individual state Secretary of State databases may have more current data. Real-time monitoring or risk scoring — this is a registry mirror, not an intelligence platform. ## Pricing - **Pricing:** Free web search with result limits. Paid API plans start at £2,250/year (Essentials), £6,600/year (Starter), £12,000/year (Basic). Enterprise pricing on request. Journalists and NGOs can apply for free API access under a share-alike public benefit licence. - **Free option:** yes - **Journalist discount:** Registered journalists, media organizations, academics, and NGOs can apply for free API access via OpenCorporates' Public Benefit programme. Independent journalists need to show published work and may be asked for a press pass. Attribution required in published work. Apply at their service desk portal. ## Security & privacy details - **Encryption in transit:** yes - **Encryption at rest:** yes - **Data jurisdiction:** United Kingdom (OpenCorporates Ltd is a UK-registered company, certified B-Corp). **Privacy policy TL;DR:** No account required for basic web searches. The underlying data comes from public government registries. OpenCorporates collects standard usage analytics. Paid and Public Benefit accounts require contact and billing information. API usage is logged. The company's Articles of Association commit it to open corporate data as a public benefit. **Practical mitigations (operational guidance, not optional):** Free web search caps results — create a free account for expanded access, or apply for a Public Benefit API key if you're a working journalist. Always cross-reference OpenCorporates results with the original registry (data freshness varies by jurisdiction — check their coverage heatmap). Pair with Aleph for document-level searches and ICIJ Offshore Leaks for leaked datasets. For beneficial ownership, supplement with Open Ownership's BODS data or the UK PSC register. Note that 'no results' API calls still count against your monthly quota. ## Ownership & business - **Owner:** OpenCorporates Ltd (United Kingdom, certified B-Corp) - **Funding model:** Revenue from paid API access, bulk data licensing, and enterprise compliance clients. Mission-driven: Articles of Association enshrine open corporate data as public benefit. - **Business model:** Freemium. Free web search, free API for qualifying journalists/NGOs (share-alike licence), paid API tiers for commercial users (£2,250–£12,000/year), enterprise bulk data licensing for compliance and fintech. Competes for compliance dollars against Orbis ($20K+/year) and Sayari ($50K+/year), but positioned as the open, affordable option. - **Open source:** no - **Built for journalism:** no **Known issues:** Nearly half of data sources are labeled 'offline' — they no longer receive regular registry updates, so dissolved or restructured companies may show stale data. Data is 'as is' from registries with no enrichment or validation layer. Beneficial ownership coverage is limited to jurisdictions that publish it (mainly UK PSC data). US coverage is uneven — some states like Alaska publish extensive data while others provide almost nothing. Paid API plans cap at 500 calls/month and 200 calls/day even on the Basic tier, and empty-result queries still consume quota. No financial data, no credit reports, no risk scoring. --- Canonical HTML: https://fieldwork.news/tools/open-corporates Full dataset: https://fieldwork.news/llms-full.txt Methodology: https://fieldwork.news/methodology