About GovCon API

GovCon API is a REST API and MCP server for U.S. federal procurement data. It is an independent service, not affiliated with, endorsed by or operated by SAM.gov, GSA or any federal agency.

Who runs it

GovCon API is run independently: the ingest, the API and support are ours, and support email is answered by a person. The legal terms are on Terms, and how we handle your account data is on Privacy.

You can see the service running: Data shows when each source last updated, and the changelog lists what has shipped and when.

How we treat the public record

Every record comes from a public government source: SAM.gov, FPDS and USAspending, SBA, GAO, GSA and agency forecast systems. You can use each source directly, and the case for using GovCon API instead is under Why GovCon API.

We keep the government's values as published. If a source record carries an award date in the year 9202, or no vendor UEI, the API returns it that way. A record we had quietly corrected could no longer be checked against the system it came from.

We change shape, not substance. Each source's own format becomes consistent JSON, and records are connected on the identifiers the systems already share, such as UEI, PIID and solicitation number.

Our work sits on top of the record. Company Profile, Vendor Risk, Recompete Watchlist and Contract Price Benchmarks are computed by us from government records, and never replace the values they are built from. Workflows describes how each one works; the comparison table on Pricing shows which plan includes it.

Every answer traces to its source

• Most responses name their source. A _sources field lists the systems behind the data, so you know where to check when something looks off, and the API guide says what each value means.
• Records keep the government's identifiers. Notice IDs, PIIDs and UEIs come back as the government assigned them, and notices carry their SAM.gov link.
• Computed results show their reasons. A Vendor Risk verdict lists the facts that put a firm in its category, and on the Recompete Watchlist each reason an incumbent may be vulnerable carries its own evidence.

Where government data falls short

Some limits of federal procurement data belong to the source, and no provider can remove them.

• Notice IDs change with amendments. SAM.gov assigns a new notice ID to each amendment, so a solicitation that seems to disappear is usually still there under a newer ID.
• Not every award names its vendor by UEI. Some award notices carry the awardee only as text, so counting a company's awards by UEI alone undercounts.
• The public entity registry is a subset. Registrants who opt out of public disclosure appear in no public API, ours included.
• Recent records arrive late upstream. The latest weeks and months look thin and then fill in: Data shows where.
• Forecasts are plans. An agency forecast says what the agency intends to buy, and its dates and values move as the plan firms up.

The dated measurements behind these limits are in the SAM.gov data structure guide and the federal contract data freshness guide.

Questions or data issues

A person reads every email sent to [email protected]. If a record looks wrong, send its notice ID, PIID or UEI and we will check it against the source.

Need something the API does not do, such as a custom endpoint? Custom work is described on Enterprise.

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