ERIC
The free, authoritative index for education research and practice.
At a Glance
- Publisher
- U.S. Institute of Education Sciences (IES), Department of Education
- Coverage
1.8M+ records of journal articles, reports, and grey literature in education dating to 1966, with growing full text (verify current counts).
- Access
Free and open; no registration; full text for many documents.
- Free alternative
- It is free; Google Scholar for reach.
- Regional
U.S.-centric but internationally used education index.
Our Take
ERIC is to education what PubMed is to biomedicine — a free, government-funded index that is the default starting point for the field, covering journal articles and the grey literature (reports, conference papers) that education research produces in abundance. Its controlled thesaurus makes precise searching possible, and much of the content is free full text. The limits: it is education-only, U.S.-leaning, and inclusion is not a quality guarantee. Use it as your precision education index; pair with a citation database for impact.
Power Tips
- Search ERIC Thesaurus descriptors, not just keywords, for reproducible results.
- Filter by full-text-available and peer-reviewed to tighten a review.
- Use it to surface grey literature — reports and conference papers the journal indexes miss.
Alternatives & Complements
PsycINFO, Google Scholar, Scopus, ProQuest
Figures last verified: June 15, 2026