SAM.gov is free. USASpending is comprehensive. So why FFID?
Because none of them show you what was funded before procurement starts. That's the gap FFID fills — congressional earmark intelligence, 12–18 months before the market forms.
What SAM.gov & Grants.gov track
Active procurement and grant opportunities — after funding has been appropriated and the agency has launched the competitive process. Useful, but late-stage.
What USASpending & Congress.gov track
All federal financial obligations and legislative records — broad and official, but not structured for earmark-level project search or business development workflows.
What FFID tracks
Congressionally directed earmarks — House CPF and Senate CDS — the moment Congress funds them. Before agency administration. Before procurement. Before SAM.gov.
The timing gap FFID fills
You see earmarks at step 2. SAM.gov shows them at step 4.
12–18 months typically separate Congressional direction from a public procurement posting. FFID gives you visibility the moment Congress acts.
Step 1
Congressional Direction
Congress designates a specific recipient and amount in the appropriations bill
Step 2
FFID
Project appears in FFID within days of publication — before any agency action
← You're here
Step 3
Agency Administration
Agency receives the appropriation and configures the program
~6 months later
Step 4
SAM.gov / Grants.gov
Procurement opportunity or grant notice published publicly
~12–18 months later
Step 5
USASpending
Federal award obligation recorded after agency action
After award
Which tool answers which question?
A quick guide for picking the right platform before you go deeper.
| If you need to answer… | Best tool |
|---|---|
| What RFPs are open today? | SAM.gov |
| Who received federal awards after obligation? | USASpending.gov |
| What did Congress pass this session? | Congress.gov / GovInfo |
| What competitive grants are open right now? | Grants.gov |
| What earmark-funded projects are forming before procurement? | FFID |
| What did a specific member fund over five fiscal years? | FFID |
| What comparable jurisdictions received CPF/CDS funding? | FFID |
| Which recipients are likely to need vendors, consultants, or advisors? | FFID |
The comparison depends on who you are
Different buyers compare FFID to different platforms. Here's the honest answer for each.
AEC & Business Development
If you rely on SAM.gov, you're starting 12–18 months late
SAM.gov is the right tool for active procurement. But by the time an RFP appears, competitors already know the project, the recipient, and in many cases, the decision-makers.
FFID shows funded recipients at the moment Congress directs the money — before the agency, before the RFP, before the market forms. That's the window where early relationships get built.
How FFID fits into your research stack
FFID is not a replacement for any of these platforms. It fills the gap they all leave open.
| Platform | Best for | The gap | FFID's role |
|---|---|---|---|
| SAM.gov | Active procurements and contract opportunities | Opportunities appear after procurement opens — typically 12–18 months after Congress directs the funding | FFID shows funded intent at the moment of congressional direction — before agency administration, before procurement, before SAM.gov |
| USASpending.gov | Tracking all awarded federal spending across agencies | Covers spending after awards are made — earmark data is scattered and not normalized for member- or project-level research | FFID tracks congressional project funding before many awards or procurements, with member- and recipient-level normalization built for business intelligence |
| Congress.gov | Legislative documents, bill text, and official congressional records | Not built for project-level search — earmark data is buried in appropriations bill text across hundreds of pages | FFID structures every CPF and CDS project into searchable, exportable intelligence — recipient, member, state, agency, amount, and status normalized for BD research |
| GovInfo | Official federal publications, appropriations documents, and legislative history | Requires manual extraction — earmark data is embedded in multi-hundred-page PDFs with no structure for project-level lookup | FFID automates that extraction: every project parsed, normalized, and updated weekly from the same source documents |
| Manual research | One-off earmark lookups using public committee reports and PDFs | Time-consuming, stale, and non-repeatable — hours of PDF parsing per research request, no cross-year comparison | FFID replaces ad-hoc PDF research with a searchable dataset covering 97,761+ projects across FY2022–FY2026, updated every week |
Detailed feature comparison
Side-by-side capabilities for the platforms most commonly used alongside FFID.
| Feature | FFID earmark platform | USASpending all obligations | SAM.gov procurement | Grants.gov grant opps | GovWin / BGov govcon intel |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
House CPF earmarks Member-directed, specific recipients | ✓ | Partial | — | — | Partial |
Senate CDS earmarks Enacted + requested data | ✓ | — | — | — | Partial |
Member sponsorship history Cross-year, by member of Congress | ✓ | — | — | — | Limited |
Recipient funding history Searchable, normalized, cross-year | ✓ | Partial | — | — | — |
Pre-RFP intelligence Before procurement is published | ✓ | — | — | — | Limited |
State-level earmark pages All 56 states & territories | ✓ | — | — | — | — |
Competitive grants RAISE, INFRA, formula grants | — | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
All federal obligations Contracts, grants, loans | — | ✓ | ✓ | Grants only | ✓ |
Free to search No account required | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | — |
Normalized & searchable Cross-year, cross-chamber | ✓ | Partial | — | — | ✓ |
CSV export For BD pipelines & reports | ✓ paid | ✓ | Limited | Limited | ✓ paid |
Award confirmation Links earmarks to actual USASpending grants | ✓ | Source only | — | — | — |
Updated weekly As Congress acts | ✓ | Monthly | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Starting price | $99/mo | Free | Free | Free | Enterprise pricing |
✓ = full coverage · Partial/Limited = some coverage · — = not tracked
When not to use FFID
FFID is not the right tool for active RFP tracking, competitive grant NOFO discovery, or broad federal obligation analysis. Use SAM.gov, Grants.gov, or USASpending for those workflows — they are free, authoritative, and purpose-built for those tasks.
Use FFID when you need upstream earmark intelligence before procurement begins — finding funded recipients, tracking member priorities, benchmarking comparable awards, and building BD pipelines 12–18 months before the market forms.
About each platform
USASpending.gov
Tracks all federal financial assistance and contracts across every agency. Earmark data is scattered and not normalized for member-level research. Best for understanding total federal spending by agency or recipient after the fact.
SAM.gov
The federal government's official procurement and award portal. Shows active contract and grant opportunities — but only after the procurement process has begun, typically 12–18 months after Congress directs the funding.
Grants.gov
Lists competitive federal grant opportunities across agencies. Does not track congressional earmarks. Competitive grants go through an application process; CPF/CDS awards go directly to specific recipients without competition.
GovWin IQ / Bloomberg Government
Broad government contracting intelligence platforms priced for enterprise government contracting teams. Not purpose-built for CPF/CDS earmark research. FFID provides earmark-specific intelligence — member history, recipient search, requested pipeline — that these platforms do not cover.
The only platform built for CPF/CDS earmark intelligence
Use FFID alongside SAM.gov and USASpending — not instead of them.
We fill the gap: the 12–18 months between congressional direction and public procurement. 97,761+ projects. $308.9B tracked. Updated weekly.