What Is A2LA? American Association for Laboratory Accreditation Explained

What A2LA is

A2LA (the American Association for Laboratory Accreditation) is a US-based, nonprofit, third-party accreditation body founded in 1978. It is one of the accreditation bodies most commonly seen on calibration certificates, test reports, and vendor capability statements issued by U.S. testing, calibration, inspection, and certification organizations. A2LA does not perform testing or calibration work itself — it independently assesses whether another organization’s laboratory, inspection body, or certification program meets a defined ISO/IEC conformity-assessment standard, then issues and maintains that organization’s accreditation on a recurring surveillance cycle.

What A2LA accredits, and against which standards

A2LA operates accreditation programs across several distinct ISO/IEC standards, each covering a different type of conformity-assessment body:

• Testing and calibration laboratories — ISO/IEC 17025, the standard behind most “A2LA accredited” claims a procurement team will see on calibration, environmental, materials, and analytical testing services.
• Medical laboratories — ISO 15189, often referenced alongside CLIA for U.S. clinical testing labs.
• Inspection bodies — ISO/IEC 17020.
• Product, management-system, and personnel certification bodies — ISO/IEC 17065, 17021-1, and 17024 respectively.
• Proficiency testing providers — ISO/IEC 17043.
• Reference material producers — ISO 17034.
• Biobanks and biorepositories — ISO 20387.

A2LA is a signatory to the International Laboratory Accreditation Cooperation (ILAC) Mutual Recognition Arrangement and the International Accreditation Forum (IAF) Multilateral Recognition Arrangement. That signatory status is what makes an A2LA-accredited test or calibration report portable internationally: other ILAC MRA signatory accreditation bodies’ accredited labs can, in principle, rely on the result without re-testing.

Why this matters for procurement

For a lab manager, procurement officer, or research administrator evaluating a supplier, “A2LA accredited” is a specific, checkable claim — not a general assurance of quality. Accreditation is issued against a defined, published scope document covering particular standards, methods, and parameters at a particular site. A supplier can be genuinely A2LA accredited and still be performing the specific test or calibration you need entirely outside that scope, so the practical procurement question is not “is this vendor accredited?” but “accredited by whom, to which standard, and does the published scope actually cover what I’m buying?” A2LA maintains a public, searchable directory of accredited organizations and their current scope documents for exactly this kind of verification before a contract or purchase order is signed.

A2LA compared with other accreditation bodies

A2LA is not the only general-purpose laboratory accreditation body operating in the U.S. ANAB (ANSI National Accreditation Board) and PJLA (Perry Johnson Laboratory Accreditation) are the other two most commonly encountered on calibration and testing certificates, and NVLAP (National Voluntary Laboratory Accreditation Program), operated directly by NIST, covers a narrower, fixed list of test categories rather than general-purpose accreditation. Because all ILAC MRA signatory bodies are themselves assessed by ILAC peer evaluation against the same underlying standard for accreditation bodies (ISO/IEC 17011), a genuine, currently valid A2LA accreditation and a genuine ANAB accreditation to the same standard and scope carry equivalent technical credibility — the meaningful comparison between suppliers is documented scope match and current status, not which accreditation body’s name is more familiar.

Examples

• A contract calibration laboratory listing A2LA ISO/IEC 17025 accreditation on its quotes, with a current scope document (checkable via A2LA’s public directory and certificate number) that specifically lists the measurement parameters and ranges a procurement team needs before a purchase order is issued.
• A biobank or biorepository citing A2LA accreditation to ISO 20387 as one verifiable data point a research-support team weighs alongside other criteria when comparing biorepository partners.

Counter-example

A vendor’s website or proposal stating it is “A2LA certified” or “ISO certified” with no certificate number, no named scope, and nothing verifiable in A2LA’s public directory is not a checkable accreditation claim — it is marketing language until confirmed against the actual scope document.

Related terms and further reading

• ANAB (ANSI National Accreditation Board)
• A2LA Accreditation: What It Covers and How to Evaluate an A2LA-Accredited Supplier — the full procurement guide, covering cost, the accreditation process and timeline, and a supplier-verification checklist.
• ANAB Accreditation: What It Covers and How to Verify It
• ISO/IEC 17025: What It Actually Accredits and How It Differs from ISO 9001
• ISO/IEC 17025 Accreditation: How to Verify a Supplier Before You Sign
• Calibration Certificates and Metrological Traceability: What “NIST-Traceable” Actually Means