Charity Impact Media

How we build this

Every figure on this site is a number a charity reported to the IRS on its own Form 990, or a ratio of two such numbers from the same filing. We don't estimate, adjust, score or grade anything.

Which charities

Every 501(c)(3) public charity in the IRS Exempt Organizations Business Master File whose latest Form 990 reports total revenue of $10 million or more, provided that filing is for one of the last three complete tax years. That is 25,343 organizations today. Private foundations (Form 990-PF) and small organizations that file Form 990-EZ or 990-N aren't covered. Churches generally don't file a Form 990, so most aren't here.

Latest filing year across covered charities: 2022: 97, 2023: 344, 2024: 22,662, 2025: 2,240.

Which filings

For each charity and each tax year since 2019 we use the latest return the IRS released. An amended return replaces the original. Filings come from the IRS's public e-file data, read from the GivingTuesday 990 Data Lake and, for returns the data lake doesn't have yet, from the IRS's monthly Form 990 releases. 149,983 filings are on the site.

The measures

  • Program services, management & general, fundraising: each column of Part IX, line 25 (total functional expenses) divided by column A. How costs are split across the three columns is the organization's own allocation.
  • Where $100 went: the same three shares, as cents of $100 (rounded so the parts add to exactly $100).
  • Fundraising cost per $1 of contributions: Part IX, line 25, column D divided by Part VIII, line 1h (all contributions, gifts and grants, including government grants). Shown only when contributions are $250,000 or more.
  • Revenue shares: Part VIII, line 1h (contributions and grants), line 1e (government grants, a part of 1h) and line 2g (program service revenue) divided by line 12 (total revenue).
  • Highest reported compensation: the largest total of Part VII, Section A, columns D, E and F (reportable compensation from the organization and from related organizations, plus other compensation such as benefits) for any listed person. Shown by role, not name.
  • Net assets in months of expenses: Part X, line 33 (end of year) divided by one month of total expenses.
  • Governance answers: the organization's yes/no answers in Parts IV, VI and XII, copied as filed. Many have explanations in Schedule O of the filing.

Medians, not ratings

Each scorecard shows the median for covered charities in the same cause (NTEE major group) when there are at least 30 of them, and across all covered charities otherwise. A median describes the group; it isn't a benchmark. A low program share can reflect a startup year, a capital campaign or an accounting choice, and a high one says nothing about whether programs work. We never label a charity or a number good or bad.

What the 990 can't tell you

  • Whether programs achieve their goals. The 990 reports spending, not outcomes.
  • Exact apples-to-apples comparisons. Fiscal years end in different months, hospitals and universities report differently from grantmakers, and group returns combine many affiliates.
  • Anything after the latest filing. Large charities often file 10 to 11 months after their fiscal year ends.

People

Form 990 lists officers, directors and key employees by name. We show their roles and compensation, not their names: the filing linked on every page has the names for anyone who needs them. Contractors are listed only when they are businesses.

Updates

A scheduled job checks the IRS and data-lake indexes every week. When new filings appear it rebuilds every page and records each new filing on the new filings page and feed. The code is public: github.com/theguysaccount/charity-impact-media.

Mistakes

If a figure here doesn't match the filing, that's our error. Report it and it's fixed in the next build.