TheStatsAPI vs football-data.org: Free Tier, Pricing & Limits Compared

If you have ever built a football project, there is a good chance you started with football-data.org. It is one of the most well-known free football APIs, maintained by Daniel Freitag since 2013, and it has helped thousands of developers get their first taste of working with real match data.

This comparison is not about tearing that down. football-data.org is a genuinely useful project with a loyal community. But if you have hit its ceiling and need more leagues, deeper stats, or production-grade throughput, you need to know what your options look like.

TheStatsAPI is a paid football-data.org alternative with 80 competitions by default (up to 1,196 available on request), player stats, and 10 years of historical data.

football-data.org Free Tier Limits (2026)

football-data.org's free tier is useful, but it is intentionally narrow. You get exactly 10 API calls per minute and access to 12 competitions only: Champions League, Premier League, La Liga, Bundesliga, Serie A, Ligue 1, Eredivisie, Primeira Liga, the Championship, Brazilian Serie A, the FIFA World Cup, and the European Championship.

That means no MLS, J-League, Saudi Pro League, Turkish Super Lig, or most second divisions on the free plan. Scores are delayed on free, not real-time, so live-score products need a paid livescores plan. Historical data is limited to the current season on free, which is fine for a dashboard but thin for model training or long-term analysis.

The free and basic plans also do not include the player data most production apps need, such as lineups, cards, and substitutions. Match statistics like corners, possession, and shots require the statistics add-on, and broader historical access requires a separate historical package. If your app needs more than scores, standings, and fixtures for the 12 free competitions, the real cost is the base plan plus the add-ons that unlock the missing data.

Quick Verdict

football-data.org is ideal for learning and prototyping. TheStatsAPI is what you move to when your project demands broader coverage, player-level data, and higher rate limits without juggling add-ons.

Who Uses football-data.org (and Why They Love It)

football-data.org has earned its place. If you are a student building your first dashboard, a hobbyist who wants Premier League scores in a Discord bot, or a side-project builder testing an idea over a weekend, it is hard to beat free.

The free tier covers 12 solid competitions: the Champions League, Premier League, La Liga, Bundesliga, Serie A, Ligue 1, Eredivisie, Primeira Liga, the Championship, the Brazilian Serie A, the FIFA World Cup, and the European Championship. That is a meaningful slice of world football, and the founder has publicly promised that free competitions will remain free forever.

The API itself is clean REST JSON (v4), the documentation is well-structured using Antora, and there is even a Postman collection to get started quickly. For what it sets out to do, it does it well.

This comparison is for the people who have already built something with football-data.org and are now running into walls.

Where You Hit the Limits

12 competitions is not enough for production

The free tier locks you to 12 leagues. That is fine for a Premier League tracker, but the moment you need MLS, the Turkish Super Lig, the Saudi Pro League, the J-League, or any second division outside of England, you are out of luck unless you upgrade. To reach 50+ competitions you need the Advanced plan at €99/mo. For 100 competitions, it is €199/mo on the Pro tier.

No player data without paid add-ons

Player-level data (lineups, substitutions, cards, squads) requires the deep data pack at €29/mo. On the free tier and the €12/mo plan, you get match scores and competition standings, but nothing about the players on the pitch.

10 calls per minute is restrictive

The free tier allows 10 API calls per minute. If your app checks multiple leagues, fetches standings, and pulls recent results, you can burn through that in seconds. Even the €12/mo plan only bumps it to 20/min.

Delayed scores on free

Free tier scores are delayed, not real-time. If you are building anything that needs up-to-date match data, you need at least the €12/mo tier for livescores.

Statistics cost extra

Want corners, possession, and shots on target? That is a separate €15/mo statistics add-on, available only from the Standard tier (€49/mo) upwards. Odds data is another €15/mo on top of that.

Costs add up quickly

A developer who needs 50+ leagues, player data, and match statistics is looking at €99/mo (Advanced) + €15/mo (statistics add-on) = €114/mo at minimum. At that price point, you are paying more than TheStatsAPI's Starter plan while still covering fewer competitions.

TheStatsAPI as the Natural Upgrade

If you have outgrown football-data.org, TheStatsAPI is designed to be the next step. Here is what changes.

80 competitions vs 12 (with up to 1,196 on request)

TheStatsAPI ships with 80 competitions covering every major league and cup, and you can request access to the full catalog of up to 1,196 competitions across the globe - top-flight leagues, second divisions, continental cups, youth tournaments, and women's competitions. You do not need to upgrade plans to unlock them; expanded coverage is included via request.

84,000+ players with full season stats

Player data is not gated behind add-ons. Every plan includes access to 84,000+ players with detailed season-by-season statistics. Goals, assists, appearances, minutes, cards, and more.

10 years of historical data

Building a model or doing analysis? TheStatsAPI includes 10 years of historical data on every plan. No separate ML add-on required.

Clean REST API

The API follows standard REST patterns with JSON responses, similar to what you are already used to with football-data.org. If you can work with one, you can work with the other.

Simple pricing, no add-ons

TheStatsAPI Starter is $50/mo and includes 100,000 requests, 30 calls per minute, and access to every endpoint. There are no feature gates between plans. No add-on charges for statistics, player data, or historical coverage. You get everything from day one.

7-day free trial

Not ready to commit? TheStatsAPI offers a 7-day free trial so you can test every endpoint against your existing codebase before paying anything.

Migration Guide: football-data.org to TheStatsAPI

Switching from football-data.org to TheStatsAPI is straightforward. The APIs follow similar REST conventions, and most endpoint mappings are nearly one-to-one.

Endpoint mapping

Authentication

football-data.org uses an X-Auth-Token header. TheStatsAPI uses a Bearer token in the Authorization header:

Authorization: Bearer THESTATSAPI_KEY

You will typically only need to change your base URL, endpoint path, and auth header configuration.

Step-by-step

1. Sign up for the 7-day trial at thestatsapi.com and grab your API key.
2. Update your base URL from https://api.football-data.org to https://api.thestatsapi.com/api.
3. Swap the auth header from X-Auth-Token to Authorization: Bearer THESTATSAPI_KEY.
4. Update endpoint paths using the mapping table above. Most routes are intuitive - persons becomes players, and the /v4/ prefix becomes /football/.
5. Adjust response parsing where needed. Field names may differ slightly, but the data structures are similar (competitions, teams, matches, players).
6. Test your critical flows - team records, match results, player lookups - and verify the data matches your expectations.

Estimated migration time

For a typical project with 5-10 API calls, expect 2-4 hours of work. Most of that time is updating paths and verifying response shapes, not rethinking your architecture.

FAQ

Is football-data.org really free?

Yes. The free tier gives you access to 12 competitions with 10 API calls per minute at no cost. The founder has stated that free competitions will remain free forever. However, the free tier comes with delayed scores, no player data (lineups, subs, cards), no match statistics (corners, possession, shots), and limited rate limits. To unlock deeper data, you need a paid plan starting at €12/mo for livescores, €29/mo for player data or historical data, or €49/mo and up for broader coverage.

What does TheStatsAPI offer that football-data.org does not?

The biggest differences are scale and simplicity. TheStatsAPI provides 80 competitions by default, with up to 1,196 competitions available on request (vs 12 on the free tier or up to 100 on football-data.org's most expensive plan), 84,000+ players with season statistics included on every plan, and 10 years of historical data with no add-ons. You do not need to piece together separate packages for player data, statistics, and competition access.

How long does it take to migrate from football-data.org?

Most developers complete the migration in 2-4 hours. Both APIs use REST with JSON responses, so the work is primarily updating base URLs, endpoint paths, and auth headers. The data models are similar enough that you will not need to redesign your application.

Does TheStatsAPI have a free plan?

TheStatsAPI does not have a permanent free tier, but it does offer a 7-day free trial with full access to every endpoint. The Starter plan begins at $50/mo with 100,000 requests and 30 calls per minute. If you are in the early exploration phase and budget is the primary constraint, football-data.org's free tier is a perfectly good place to start. TheStatsAPI is where you move when you need more.

What is the cheapest football API with player stats?

On football-data.org, player data (lineups, substitutions, cards, squads) requires the deep data add-on at €29/mo, on top of a base plan. TheStatsAPI includes full player statistics on every plan starting at $50/mo, with 84,000+ players and season-by-season data. If player stats are a core requirement for your project, TheStatsAPI's all-inclusive pricing is typically more cost-effective than assembling football-data.org add-ons.