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The soccer API: free tiers, open data and StrikerAPI

football-data.org, StatsBomb open data, soccerdata and Understat are free in different ways. Where each fits, what their terms say, and how StrikerAPI differs.

Comparison facts checked October 14, 2026. StrikerAPI data last refreshed 2026-10-14 10:00 UTC, newest data through 2026-10-12. Changelog

There is no single free soccer API. football-data.org has a free-forever plan for 12 competitions with delayed scores and 10 calls a minute. StatsBomb publishes free event data for selected competitions on GitHub, for research, with a credit line. Understat shows expected goals for six leagues on its site. soccerdata is an open-source Python package that scrapes several sites, FBref among them, and worldfootballR, its R counterpart, was archived in September 2025. FBref itself has no API, and Sports Reference's terms restrict automated access and bar building a competing database from its data.

StrikerAPI is a documented soccer data API and MCP server for seventeen competitions, with every tool described, a live example for each, and 500 free credits every month. It serves fixtures, lineups, match events, the location of every charted shot with our expected goals, tables, Elo ratings and per-sportsbook lines from 2017-18, from public ESPN data. For a fixtures and tables app, football-data.org's free plan may be enough. For published research on specific competitions, StatsBomb's open data is richer than ours. For a product, a backtest against sportsbook lines or an AI agent across the top leagues, a keyed, documented API saves the stitching.

The options

  • football-data.org

    A long-running football API: fixtures, results and tables, with lineups, goalscorers, cards and squads on paid plans. Odds and statistics are add-ons.

    Live. On 2026-10-14 its pricing page listed a Free plan at 0 euros for 12 competitions (scores delayed, 10 calls a minute), Free + Deep Data at 29 euros, Standard at 49 euros for 30 competitions, Advanced at 99 euros for 50 and Pro at 199 euros for 100+. An Odds add-on was 15 euros a month and a Stats Pro add-on, which lists xG and xA, was 30 euros a month.

  • StatsBomb open data

    Free event-level football data as JSON: matches, lineups and events, with competitions.json listing 80 competition-seasons across 24 competitions, for men's and women's football.

    The repository now lives at hudl/open-data, last pushed 2026-09-07. Its README offers the data for research and genuine interest in football analytics and asks that you name StatsBomb as the source and use its logo if you publish. Selected competitions only, not full leagues every season.

  • Understat

    A site with expected goals for teams and players in the Premier League, La Liga, Bundesliga, Serie A, Ligue 1 and the Russian Premier League.

    Live. We found no documented API on it.

  • probberechts/soccerdata

    A Python package of scrapers for Club Elo, ESPN, FBref, Football-Data.co.uk, Sofascore, SoFIFA, Understat and WhoScored, returning pandas data frames and caching downloads locally.

    Apache-2.0. Latest release v1.9.1 on 2026-07-24; last pushed 2026-10-14. Its README asks you to follow each site's terms and warns that site changes will break scrapers.

  • JaseZiv/worldfootballR

    An R package that wrapped FBref, Transfermarkt and Understat.

    Archived on GitHub; last pushed 2025-09-18. Its README says the package will no longer be maintained.

  • FBref (Sports Reference)

    A football statistics site with no public API.

    Its data-use page restricts scripts, bots and scrapers that adversely impact the site, bars using its data to build a database that competes with it, and sets a $5,000 minimum for custom downloads.

  • API-Football (api-sports.io)

    A commercial football API sold by request quota.

    Its site and documentation returned HTTP 403 to a scripted request on 2026-10-14, so we did not re-check its plans or prices for this guide.

Side by side

StrikerAPIthe free soccer data sources
Price and key500 free credits a month, then from $19/mo; a free keyfootball-data.org: free plan, paid from 29 euros a month. StatsBomb open data, soccerdata and Understat: free
DocumentationEvery tool documented with parameters, response fields and a live examplefootball-data.org and StatsBomb publish documentation. soccerdata has a docs site. Understat: none found
CompetitionsSeventeen, on one schemafootball-data.org: 12 free, 30 to 100+ by tier. StatsBomb: 24 selected competitions. Understat: 6 leagues
Shot locationsget_shot_map: x/y, end point, outcome and body part for every charted shot since 2012-13StatsBomb open data: events with locations for its selected competitions. football-data.org: not listed on its pricing page
Expected goalsOurs, on every located shot, summed per match, team and playerUnderstat: shown on its site for six leagues. football-data.org: the Stats Pro add-on at 30 euros a month. StatsBomb events carry their own xG
Sportsbook linesEach book's home, draw and away, handicap and total from 2017-18; opening and closing lines from 2020football-data.org: pre-match odds as a 15 euro add-on; how far back it goes is not stated on the pricing page. The others: none
Terms for automated useKeyed API intended for products and modelsFBref: restricted, with a no-compete clause. StatsBomb: credit and logo when you publish. soccerdata: you answer to each scraped site's terms
AI assistantsMCP server for Claude, ChatGPT and CursorNone of these list one; the soccerdata README does not mention MCP
Live in-match dataNo: results land each morningfootball-data.org: live scores from its 12 euro plan

Example call

Arsenal's 2025-26 Premier League shots by zone, with goals, shots on target and our expected goals. Pass include_shots: true to get every shot's x/y and outcome as well. The same view from the free sources means joining shot events yourself.

bash
curl -X POST https://mcp.strikerapi.com/v1/get_shot_map \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -H "x-api-key: YOUR_API_KEY" \
  -d '{
  "team": "ARS",
  "season": 2025,
  "include_shots": false
}'
json
{"data": {"season": 2025, "zones": [{"zone": "six_yard_box", "shots": 83, "goals": 19, "on_target": 28, "headers": 53, "xg": 26.8, "conversion": 0.229, "share": 0.16}, {"zone": "penalty_area", "shots": 298, "goals": 34, "on_target": 97, "headers": 59, "xg": 35.57, "conversion": 0.114, "share": 0.573}, {"zone": "outside_box", "shots": 135, "goals": 10, "on_target": 40, "headers": 2, "xg": 6.52, "conversion": 0.074, "share": 0.26}, {"zone": "penalty", "shots": 4, "goals": 4, "on_target": 4, "headers": 0, "xg": 3.25, "conversion": 1, "share": 0.008}], "shots_total": 538, "totals": {"shots": 538, "located": 520, "goals": 67, "on_target": 169, "xg": 72.14, "xg_per_shot": 0.139}, "unlocated_shots": 18}}

Responses are wrapped in a data object. get_shot_map costs 10 credits.

Use the free soccer data sources instead if

  • You need fixtures, scores and tables for a handful of leagues and football-data.org's free plan covers your usage.
  • You are doing research on a competition StatsBomb covers, such as a World Cup or a past La Liga season, and want its event data.
  • You need competitions outside our seventeen. football-data.org lists lower divisions and cups, and soccerdata reaches other sites.
  • You need live scores during matches. StrikerAPI updates each morning.
  • You work in Python or R notebooks and are happy to maintain scrapers.

Questions

Is there a free soccer API?

football-data.org has a free-forever plan: 12 competitions, delayed scores and 10 calls a minute. StrikerAPI is also free to start, with 500 credits every month, and covers seventeen competitions with shot locations, expected goals and sportsbook lines.

Where can I get free soccer shot data?

StatsBomb's open data on GitHub has events with locations for selected competitions, for research and with credit to StatsBomb. StrikerAPI's get_shot_map covers every charted shot in seventeen competitions since 2012-13.

Where can I get free expected goals data?

Understat shows xG for six leagues on its site, and StatsBomb's open events carry xG for its selected competitions. football-data.org sells xG in a 30 euro a month add-on. StrikerAPI includes its own xG on every located shot.

Can I scrape FBref?

FBref has no API, and Sports Reference's data-use terms restrict scripts, bots and scrapers that adversely impact the site and bar using its data to build a competing database. Read them, and ask Sports Reference, before building on it.

Is worldfootballR still maintained?

No. The repository is archived, was last pushed on 2025-09-18, and its README says the package will no longer be maintained.

Is there a soccer odds API?

football-data.org sells pre-match odds as a 15 euro a month add-on. StrikerAPI keeps each sportsbook's three-way lines, handicaps and totals from 2017-18, with opening and closing lines from June 2020 for 16 competitions.

Can Claude or ChatGPT use StrikerAPI?

Yes. StrikerAPI runs an MCP server at mcp.strikerapi.com, so Claude, ChatGPT and Cursor can call the same tools as the REST API.

Sources

Checked October 14, 2026.

See the data

Premier League shot location and xG dataPremier League match event dataPremier League historical oddsAnytime goalscorer prices by sportsbook

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