vs
CollegeFootballData.com vs Retrosheet (2026)
Short answer: The two score about the same (57 vs 55). Retrosheet is the better pick for baseball researchers and hobbyists who want free bulk MLB play-by-play, game logs and schedules as downloadable CSV files.
From public data checked . How we know
Choose CollegeFootballData.com if you…
Free / open data
Best for: College football analysts, hobbyists and apps that need games, play-by-play, recruiting and betting-line history through a free key.
- ✓ need College sports, American football, Basketball
- ✓ need commercial use allowed in the public terms
- ✓ value a large open-source ecosystem of wrappers and examples
Not ideal for: Projects that need other leagues, redistribution of the data, or live data on the free tier; higher tiers run through Patreon.
What developers say
Free college football API behind a Python wrapper and the cfbfastR R package, shown in public-API lists, tutorials and BI-tool walkthroughs. Used for scores, betting lines and play-by-play. One user notes plays lack formation data. Little direct opinion beyond that, so assessment is mostly adoption-based.
Choose Retrosheet if you…
Free / open data
Best for: Baseball researchers and hobbyists who want free bulk MLB play-by-play, game logs and schedules as downloadable CSV files.
- ✓ need Baseball
- ✓ care most about what developers report in practice
Not ideal for: Apps that need a live API or current-day data; Retrosheet offers bulk file downloads only, with a copyright notice on the data.
What developers say
Volunteer-run archive of MLB play-by-play, game logs and schedules as downloadable files, not a hosted API. Recommended on HN and betting forums for model building and ETL practice, and widely used by tools such as Chadwick and boxball Docker images. Free and deep history back to 1914; you must parse and host it yourself.
Side by side
| CollegeFootballData.com | Retrosheet | |
|---|---|---|
| SportDex Score | 57/100 (#26) | 55/100 (#31) |
| Popularity | 46 | 36 |
| Community & reliability | Not enough data | 69 |
| Transparency | 65 | 75 |
| Developer experience | 68 | 51 |
| Type | Free / open data | Free / open data |
| Starting price | Free tier | Free tier |
| Free tier | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | Not stated | Not stated |
| Sports | College sports, American football, Basketball | Baseball |
| Data | Fixtures, Historical data, Odds, Play-by-play, Player stats, Results, Team stats | Fixtures, Historical data, Play-by-play, Results, Team stats |
| Delivery | Polling only (REST) | CSV download |
| Protocols | REST, GraphQL | CSV download |
| Live / in-play | Not disclosed | No |
| Commercial use | Commercial: Allowed | Commercial: not disclosed |
| Betting products | Betting: not disclosed | Betting: not disclosed |
| Documentation | Docs | Docs |
| Developer discussions | 2 | 6 |
| GitHub repos | 1.1k | 347 |
| Community tone | Neutral | Mostly positive |
Empty fields mean the provider does not say, not that the feature is missing.
Quick answers
- Is CollegeFootballData.com or Retrosheet better?
- The two score about the same (57 vs 55). Retrosheet is the better pick for baseball researchers and hobbyists who want free bulk MLB play-by-play, game logs and schedules as downloadable CSV files.
- Which is cheaper, CollegeFootballData.com or Retrosheet?
- CollegeFootballData.com: Free tier. Retrosheet: Free tier. Entry plans differ in limits and coverage, so compare what each plan includes.
- Do CollegeFootballData.com and Retrosheet have a free tier?
- CollegeFootballData.com: yes. Retrosheet: yes.