Is there an API for IRS Form 990 data?

No, not from the IRS as a query API: it publishes the Tax Exempt Organization Search and bulk files, namely e-filed Form 990 series returns as XML in yearly zip files, the Exempt Organizations Business Master File as CSV, and the SOI annual extracts of selected financial fields. The Olympus US Nonprofit Financial Data API joins those IRS files by EIN: GET /v1/nonprofit-financials/organizations/{ein}/financials returns an organisation's Form 990, 990-EZ or 990-PF revenue, expenses, assets and liabilities by tax year as JSON, with the e-filed returns the IRS lists for it.

By New Odyssey · Published 2026-10-24 · Markdown

The official route, and what it lacks

The IRS's exempt organisation data pages list these routes, and none of them is a query API:

• Tax Exempt Organization Search (TEOS). The IRS web search of tax-exempt organisations.
• Form 990 series downloads. E-filed returns as XML, in zip files organised by year, with a yearly index file. The IRS says its bulk data files "are updated monthly".
• Exempt Organizations Business Master File Extract (EO BMF). A cumulative file of the organisations on the IRS Business Master File, as CSV: one file per state, DC and Puerto Rico, an international file and four regional files.
• SOI annual extract. "Selected financial data" from Forms 990, 990-EZ and 990-PF, one zip per form and year, with field lists.

What that leaves to you: finding one organisation's figures means downloading and joining files by EIN, parsing return XML, and knowing that the SOI extracts trail filing by a year or more. There is no IRS endpoint that takes an EIN and returns its financials.

What the US Nonprofit Financial Data API serves

IRS exempt organisations by EIN from the Exempt Organizations Business Master File, Form 990, 990-EZ and 990-PF revenue, expenses and assets from the IRS SOI annual extracts, the index of e-filed returns the IRS publishes, and name-prefix search.

Limits

• Figures are as filed with the IRS and extracted by SOI: nothing is estimated or corrected.
• SOI extracts trail filing by a year or more, so the latest tax periods of an organisation may be missing.
• Name search returns organisations whose name starts with the query: candidates, not matches; confirm with the EIN.
• Where an extract carries two lines with the same EIN and tax period, the first is kept (counted in coverage).

Not included: parsed e-file XML or Form 990 schedules; officer or employee compensation; donors; charity ratings or scores; state charity registrations.

Example request and response

An organisation's figures by tax year (the example EIN, 530196605, is the American National Red Cross's):

curl -s "https://api.olympus.new-odyssey.com/v1/nonprofit-financials/organizations/530196605/financials" \
  -H "X-API-Key: $OLYMPUS_API_KEY"

{
  "data": {
    "ein": "530196605",
    "name": "…",
    "financials": [
      {
        "form": "990",
        "tax_period": "…",
        "tax_year": …,
        "total_revenue": …,
        "total_expenses": …,
        "contributions": …,
        "program_service_revenue": …,
        "total_assets_eoy": …,
        "total_liabilities_eoy": …,
        "net_assets_eoy": …,
        "provenance": { "source_id": "irs.soi_eo_extract", "source_url": "…" }
      }
    ],
    "efile_returns": [
      {
        "object_id": "…",
        "return_type": "990",
        "tax_period": "…",
        "index_year": …,
        "xml_batch_url": "…",
        "provenance": { "source_id": "irs.teos_xml_index", "source_url": "…" }
      }
    ],
    "sections": { "financials": "found", "efile_returns": "found" }
  },
  "meta": {
    "datasets": [{ "dataset_id": "…", "freshness": "fresh" }],
    "notices": [{ "code": "figures_as_filed", "message": "…" }]
  }
}

GET /v1/nonprofit-financials/organizations/{ein} returns the organisation itself from the IRS Exempt Organizations Business Master File (name, city, state, NTEE code, subsection, ruling date) with its latest figures. GET /v1/nonprofit-financials/organizations?name= finds organisations whose name starts with your query: candidates to confirm with the EIN.

Coverage and refresh

Coverage: Organisations the IRS lists in the Exempt Organizations Business Master File (region files eo1-eo4).

• EO BMF: the latest monthly IRS files loaded; the file date is in every record's provenance.
• Financials: the SOI extracts of the processing years loaded (e.g. the 2024 extracts); tax_year is the year the tax period begins, as the IRS uses it.
• E-filed returns: the IRS index years loaded (e.g. 2025); GET /v1/nonprofit-financials/coverage lists every file and year.

Refresh: Monthly (the 16th, after the IRS's mid-month refresh); unchanged files are not downloaded again. GET /v1/nonprofit-financials/coverage lists exactly what is loaded right now.

Price

Every Olympus plan includes the US Nonprofit Financial Data API and every other live API. The Free plan (no card) gives 1,000 requests a month to each live API at 10 requests a minute. Paid plans: Developer $79 a month (50,000 requests per API), Growth $299 a month (250,000 requests per API), Business $999 a month (1,000,000 requests per API); Enterprise from $2,500 a month on request. Prices in USD; see pricing for rate limits and what counts as a request.

Docs

• US Nonprofit Financial Data API: what it serves and its endpoints
• API reference; OpenAPI contract at /openapi/nonprofit-financials.yaml
• Coverage and known limits
• How to read a Form 990
• Get a free API key, then send it in the X-API-Key header
• From an AI agent: the MCP server describes this API's coverage with get_product_coverage; data calls go through the REST API

Questions

Sources

• IRS: Tax Exempt Organization Search bulk data downloads
• IRS: Form 990 series downloads
• IRS: Exempt Organizations Business Master File Extract (EO BMF)
• IRS: SOI Tax Stats: Annual Extract of Tax-Exempt Organization Financial Data

Related docs

• US Nonprofit Financial Data API
• Nonprofit Financial Data API reference
• How to read a Form 990
• Is there an API for Form 5500 filings?