NFL data API pricing compared
Quick answer: GridIron Data's Basic plan is $45 a year (or $5 month to month) for current-season projections, actuals back to 2020, snap share, news and the schedule; a free plan gives 50 requests a month. SportsDataIO's self-serve fantasy data starts at $99 a month and is delayed a day; MySportsFeeds starts at $5 a month (CAD) for personal use; Sportradar has a 30-day trial and sells production access through sales. nflverse is free, open data for historical analysis, delivered as files rather than a hosted API.
- GridIron Basic
- $45/yr
- GridIron Pro
- $29/mo
- Free plan
- 50 req/mo
- Card for free plan
- Not needed
How do the prices compare?
| Provider | Cheapest way in | Paid price shown publicly | Good fit for |
|---|---|---|---|
| GridIron Data | Free: 50 requests/month, no card | Basic $45/year or $5/month; Pro $29/month or $249/year | Fantasy tools, bots and betting models that need this week's data |
| SportsDataIO | Free trial with scrambled values and a small daily call limit; Discovery Lab free tier with last season's data | Discovery Lab Fantasy $99/month or $599/year; Fantasy + Odds $149/month or $899/year. Commercial pricing is quoted by sales | Companies that need many sports and a commercial agreement |
| MySportsFeeds | Free trial on request | NFL personal use from $5/month, commercial from $39/month (CAD, Non-Live core feeds); add-ons such as projections priced separately | Raw stats feeds across several leagues, priced per league and add-on |
| Sportradar | 30-day trial: 1,000 requests per rolling 30 days at 1 per second | Not listed; production access is for Sportradar customers | Businesses that need official, live, multi-sport feeds |
| nflverse | Free and open source | Free | Historical and play-by-play analysis in R or Python |
"Cheapest way in" is the lowest-cost option each provider lists on its own site. Plans differ in what they cover, so read the rows below before you compare numbers.
What does GridIron Data's $45 a year include?
Basic is $45 a year, about $3.75 a month, or $5 month to month. It gives 5,000 requests a month at 30 a minute and every standard endpoint:
- Weekly and rest-of-season projections in PPR, half-PPR and standard (
/projections/{week},/projections/ros). - Game-by-game actuals from 2020 through the current season (
/stats), updated the day after games. - Snap share, actual-vs-projected deviations, matchup history and impact-tagged news.
- The NFL schedule and bye weeks.
- Injury status on every player, checked against ESPN every few minutes on game days.
Pro is the betting plan at $29 a month or $249 a year: 50,000 requests a month plus player prop probabilities (/props), defense vs position (/defense), spreads, totals and moneylines on /schedule, per-stat projections, and an injury changes feed with webhooks.
The free plan is 50 requests a month with no card. It covers player lookups and this week's projections, which is enough to wire the API into your code.
curl -H "x-api-key: YOUR_KEY" \
"https://api.gridirondata.com/api/v1/projections/8?position=QB&scoring=half"SportsDataIO
SportsDataIO covers many sports, and its NFL API lists fantasy projections, odds and player props among its feeds. Its free trial needs no card but returns scrambled values: some numbers are moved up or down 5% to 20% so the data can't be used in production. Its Discovery Lab, aimed at students and hobbyists, has a free tier with last season's data and paid Fantasy or Odds packages at $99 a month or $599 a year ($149 a month or $899 a year for both). Discovery Lab data is delayed by one day and is not licensed for commercial redistribution. Commercial pricing depends on use case and volume and goes through sales.
MySportsFeeds
MySportsFeeds lists NFL personal-use pricing from $5 a month and commercial pricing from $39 a month, both for core feeds at the Non-Live access level. Prices are in Canadian dollars. Faster access levels and add-ons such as projections, DFS and odds are priced separately. A subscription includes the two most recent seasons; older seasons are one-time purchases from $19 to $69 each.
Sportradar
Sportradar describes its APIs as a business-to-business service. Its trials last 30 days with 1,000 requests per rolling 30 days at one query per second. Production access is reserved for Sportradar customers, and no price is published. It is the choice when you need official, live, multi-sport data under a commercial contract.
nflverse (free)
nflverse is the open-source community project behind much public NFL analysis. It publishes play-by-play back to 1999, rosters, player stats and snap counts as files on GitHub, loaded with nflreadr in R or nflreadpy in Python. Play-by-play and player stats update nightly after game days in season. The code is MIT-licensed and most of the data is CC-BY 4.0. For historical research and play-by-play modeling it is excellent, and free.
It is a dataset, not a hosted API: you download files and query them yourself. GridIron Data is the hosted, current-week side: a JSON API with this week's projections, injury status checked every few minutes, news and, on Pro, prop probabilities. Many projects use both.
Which one should I pick?
- A fantasy app, Discord bot or league tool: GridIron Basic at $45 a year. Start on the free plan.
- A betting or DFS model: GridIron Pro for prop probabilities, betting lines and defense vs position, at $29 a month.
- Historical or play-by-play research: nflverse, free.
- Live in-game data across many sports under contract: Sportradar or SportsDataIO. GridIron has no live in-game stats.
Frequently asked questions
What is the cheapest NFL data API?
nflverse is free but ships files, not a hosted API. GridIron Data has a free plan (50 requests a month, no card) and Basic at $45 a year for every standard endpoint. MySportsFeeds lists personal-use NFL pricing from $5 a month in Canadian dollars.
Does GridIron Data have a free trial?
It has a free plan instead: 50 requests a month with no credit card and no end date. It covers player lookups and this week's projections; the data is real, not scrambled.
Is GridIron Data cheaper than SportsDataIO?
For fantasy data, yes: GridIron Basic is $45 a year, and SportsDataIO's self-serve Discovery Lab Fantasy package is listed at $99 a month or $599 a year, with data delayed one day. SportsDataIO covers many more sports and live feeds.
Can I use nflverse and GridIron together?
Yes. nflverse is great for historical play-by-play; GridIron adds a hosted API for this week's projections, injuries, news and prop probabilities. Join them on player name and position, or on ESPN athlete id where both have it.