Direct comparison
Open Funder Registry Vs Ror: Key Differences & Comparison | CASRAI
The Open Funder Registry is Crossref's funder identifier list (originally FundRef); ROR is an open, community-led registry of all research organisations, including funders. Funder identification is moving toward ROR.
Side-by-side comparison
| Dimension | Open Funder Registry | ROR |
|---|---|---|
| Scope | Funding organisations only | All research organisations, including funders |
| Origin | Crossref registry, originally launched as FundRef | Community-led registry of research organisations |
| Openness/licence | Crossref-maintained funder list | Open data released under a CC0 public-domain dedication |
| Governance | Maintained by Crossref | Open, community-led governance |
| Identifier format | Funder DOIs identifying funding bodies | ROR IDs (persistent identifiers for organisations) |
| Announced transition | Funder identification moving toward ROR | The target scheme for identifying funders going forward |
| Adoption | Long used in Crossref funding metadata | Rapidly adopted across publishers, funders, and systems |
| Metadata role | Tags the funder in output funding metadata | Identifies organisations consistently across the ecosystem |
Common questions
FAQ
Are funders being moved from the Open Funder Registry to ROR?+
Yes — the announced direction is to migrate funder identification toward ROR, so that funders are identified within the open Research Organization Registry alongside all other research organisations, rather than in a separate funder-only registry.
Why use ROR for funders instead of a dedicated funder list?+
ROR is open, community-led, and covers all research organisations under a CC0 dedication, so using it for funders gives a single, openly licensed identifier scheme for organisations across the metadata ecosystem, reducing fragmentation between separate funder and organisation registries.
What was FundRef?+
FundRef was the original name for what became the Open Funder Registry — Crossref's list of funding bodies used to identify who funded research in funding metadata. The funder-identification function it served is now moving toward ROR.
Going deeper
