Is there a cheap alternative to Candid Foundation Directory (formerly Foundation Center / GuideStar)?

Yes. Candid Foundation Directory (formerly Foundation Center / GuideStar)'s underlying data is public: IRS Form 990/990-PF e-file XML + SOI extracts (US public domain (17 USC §105)); IRS Exempt Organizations Business Master File (US public domain). Incumbent: $2k–12k/yr per seat. Rebuilt: pennies of compute per foundation lookup; a $0.20–0.25 per-call price undercuts a seat by ~99% for occasional users.

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Candid Foundation Directory (formerly Foundation Center / GuideStar): what you're actually paying for

Q: What data does Candid Foundation Directory (formerly Foundation Center / GuideStar) actually use?

Parsing, entity-linking and search UX over IRS filings that are public domain. Candid's grant records, funder profiles and payout histories are overwhelmingly derived from Form 990/990-PF data the IRS publishes for free, plus self-reported profile enrichment. Key sources: IRS Form 990/990-PF e-file XML + SOI extracts — US public domain (17 USC §105); IRS Exempt Organizations Business Master File — US public domain.

Q: Is it legal to rebuild Candid Foundation Directory (formerly Foundation Center / GuideStar) from public data?

Facts and public-domain government data are not copyrightable, but there are real traps here: ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer API is CC BY-NC-ND — do NOT build a commercial product on it; go to the IRS/NCCS primary files The SOI extract's qualifying-distributions column is unpopulated for ~93% of rows — payout-compliance claims must be conservative (signal, never determination) This is research, not legal advice.

Yes — rebuildable from free public data

Candid Foundation Directory (formerly Foundation Center / GuideStar) typically costs $2,000–$12,000/yr depending on tier. Its core dataset is not proprietary: it is built on IRS Form 990/990-PF e-file XML + SOI extracts; IRS Exempt Organizations Business Master File — public sources you can access directly for free. What the subscription actually adds is parsing, entity-linking and search UX over IRS filings that are public domain. Candid's grant records, funder profiles and payout histories are overwhelmingly derived from Form 990/990-PF data the IRS publishes for free, plus self-reported profile enrichment.

The free public data underneath

Source	License	Access
IRS Form 990/990-PF e-file XML + SOI extracts	US public domain (17 USC §105)	irs.gov downloads; NCCS mirrors
IRS Exempt Organizations Business Master File	US public domain	irs.gov/charities-non-profits (state-partitioned files)

Rebuild recipe

Pull SOI extracts + BMF from IRS.gov/NCCS (the old AWS 990 bucket is dead since 2021 — do not use it)
Parse 990-PF Part I/X/XII/XIII for giving capacity, payout math, grant lists
Entity-resolve on EIN; join BMF for status/assets/NTEE classification
Serve per-lookup instead of per-seat

DIY difficulty: moderate — the XML schemas are messy across vintages; field-population gaps require conservative handling

The price math

Incumbent: $2k–12k/yr per seat. Rebuilt: pennies of compute per foundation lookup; a $0.20–0.25 per-call price undercuts a seat by ~99% for occasional users.

Licensing and legal traps

ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer API is CC BY-NC-ND — do NOT build a commercial product on it; go to the IRS/NCCS primary files
The SOI extract's qualifying-distributions column is unpopulated for ~93% of rows — payout-compliance claims must be conservative (signal, never determination)

The pay-per-call alternative, live today:

https://grantpulse.theaslangroupllc.com/api/grant/org-intel ($0.20)
https://grantpulse.theaslangroupllc.com/api/grant/funder-990 ($0.25)

GrantPulse — no subscription, no seat license, USDC per call via x402. Agents can pay programmatically.

Decompose any data product programmatically: GET https://pulse.theaslangroupllc.com/api/unbundle?product=Candid — $1.00 per call via x402. 22 products decomposed; honest misses for everything else.

Research as of 2026-07-06 by The Aslan Group LLC (info@theaslangroupllc.com). Product names are used nominatively to identify the products analyzed; all trademarks belong to their owners. Pricing is as publicly reported or contract-disclosed at research time and may change. This is research for build-vs-buy evaluation, not legal advice — verify licenses against the primary source before building.