Over the past few years, ACLED has expanded to cover more than 150 countries and territories, collecting data on almost a million political violence and demonstration events around the world. While we are fast approaching global real-time coverage, ACLED remains a small NGO, requiring us to take new steps to strengthen our impact as a non-profit public good and lay the groundwork for continued success and sustainability. 

Today we are pleased to announce the first step towards ensuring our data and analysis remain widely available for years to come: the ACLED Access Portal, a new registration system designed to maintain free public access to the dataset while providing greater oversight and tailored support.

Starting in October 2020, ACLED is: 

    • Launching the new portal and registration system;
    • Inviting users to register and create an account;
    • And asking users to generate a unique key to access the data export tool and API.

In order to guarantee continued access to ACLED data without interruption, please register your account through the new portal and generate your unique access key by 18 October. After 18 October, you will be required to enter your access key and account information to download data through the ACLED website or API. 

For step-by-step instructions explaining how to generate a key and access data through the new system, please consult the registration guide. For additional information about accessing the API through the new system, please consult the updated API guide. Should you have any questions or concerns along the way, please contact the ACLED team via our new dedicated registration helpdesk at [email protected]. 

Alongside the registration system, over the next two months, ACLED will introduce a new access model in order to improve sustainability, prevent the misuse and resale of ACLED data to third parties, and enable us to diversify revenue streams to protect our independence as a non-profit organization.

In this new model, ACLED data will remain free to the public for extensive, though not unlimited, use. Those who wish to gain further access will be able to contact us to discuss their needs on a case-by-case basis.

We will be providing more information and resources around the registration system and access model in the coming weeks and months to ensure a smooth transition for all users. In the meantime, please check the FAQs and send any questions to [email protected].

We are confident that these changes will help to safeguard ACLED’s position as a global public good, ensuring the wide availability of ACLED data well into the future. Thank you for being a member of our user community and for your continued trust in our work.