PlainGrants turns two public federal records, the SAM.gov Assistance Listings (formerly the CFDA) and the funding opportunities published on Grants.gov, into searchable, plain-language pages for every program, opportunity, agency, and category. This page explains how those pages are produced, what standards they are held to, how derived figures are computed, and how to report a number that looks wrong so we can fix it at the source.

How these pages are produced

Every funding range, opportunity count, award ceiling, and date on PlainGrants originates in an official public record. We ingest the SAM.gov Assistance Listings for the program catalog and Grants.gov for the live and historical funding opportunities, load everything through a documented, version-controlled data pipeline, and render it into program, opportunity, agency, category, ranking, and guide pages using shared templates. No data page is hand-written and no funding figure is typed in by an editor, each value you see is read directly from the source record at build time, so the same number is consistent wherever it appears.

Our editorial identity is responsible for the parts a pipeline cannot decide on its own: which datasets to use, how each measure is defined and labeled, how derived figures (distributions, rankings, concentration shares) are computed, see our methodology - which guides we write, and what we will not publish. The pipeline then applies those decisions uniformly across every page, so the rule that governs one program page governs all of them.

How derived figures are computed

Most numbers on PlainGrants are reported directly from the source (a program's funding range, an opportunity's award ceiling and close date). Where a figure is derived, we compute it transparently from the same source data. "Estimated funding by category," for example, is the sum of the estimated total program funding that agencies publish on each indexed Grants.gov opportunity, grouped by category, and we label it as announced estimated funding on indexed opportunities, not appropriated obligations, because the distinction changes what the number means. Rankings surface a single reproducible metric and link to the underlying records so you can verify the order yourself.

Sourcing standards

We publish only data that comes from official public sources, and we name the source on every page:

• SAM.gov Assistance Listings: the U.S. General Services Administration's official catalog of federal assistance programs (formerly the Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance) - the source for every program, CFDA number, agency, category, and funding range. Verify any listing at sam.gov.
• Grants.gov: the central federal portal for funding opportunity announcements, the source for opportunity titles, award ceilings and floors, estimated funding, and posting and closing dates. Verify any opportunity at grants.gov.

We do not scrape third-party sites, we do not republish self-reported figures as our own, and we do not invent eligibility, deadlines, or award amounts. Where a figure is derived from the official data, the page links to our methodology, which sets out exactly how it is calculated.

Accuracy and validation

Because the numbers are read straight from the SAM.gov and Grants.gov records, the most common limitation is the underlying record or its vintage rather than a transcription error. Program details and deadlines change between funding cycles, opportunities open and close on their own schedules, and award data can lag the actual obligation. Our pipeline shows a value as unavailable when the source omits it, never infers a figure that is not published, and reconciles program, agency, and category rollups so the same figure is consistent everywhere.

When we find that a displayed number is wrong, we fix the cause, not the symptom. We trace the value back to the data layer, correct the derivation or labeling rule there, and regenerate the affected pages, so the same class of error is resolved everywhere at once rather than patched on a single page.

Editorial independence

PlainGrants does not accept payment, sponsorship, or promoted placement from applicants, grant consultants, or any organization in exchange for how programs are presented or ordered. Our only revenue source is contextual display advertising. Advertisers have no influence over which programs we list, how a funding figure is reported, or how any page ranks.

Update schedule

SAM.gov maintains the active assistance listings continuously, and Grants.gov posts new opportunities as agencies announce them. We refresh our database from the latest official exports on a regular cadence and re-stamp the affected pages so the published date reflects when the data genuinely changed, not when the page was last rebuilt.

Corrections process

If a figure looks wrong, please tell us. We treat data-error reports as a priority and follow the same process every time:

1. Report. Email hello@plaingrants.com with the page URL and the figure you are questioning.
2. Verify. We check the value against the official SAM.gov listing or Grants.gov opportunity, using the CFDA or opportunity number.
3. Fix at the source. If the figure is wrong on our side, we correct the underlying data or derivation rule and regenerate every page it affects.
4. Note it. If the figure is correct but reflects a known limitation, a program updated between cycles, or an opportunity that has since closed, we explain the caveat rather than silently changing it.

Some apparent errors trace back to the official record itself. When that is the case, we will tell you so and point you to sam.gov and grants.gov so you can verify directly.

Contact

Questions about our standards, methodology, or a specific figure are welcome at hello@plaingrants.com. For more on what the data covers and how it is processed, see our About page and methodology. For how to use this information responsibly before applying, see our disclaimer.