CIA World Factbook Archive
Learning and science
public data archive
SHOW HN2026
Legend
CIA World Factbook Archive
CIA World Factbook Archive (1990–2025), searchable and exportable
cia-factbook-archive.fly.dev#cia world factbook#country data archive#historical country statistics#factbook export
How HN took it
17 positive, 8 neutral or asking, 1 mixed, 13 critical, out of 39 comments about the project. Thread score +0.09.
Idea: 9 for, 1 againstExecution: 0 for, 9 againstDesign: 2 for, 2 againstPerformance: 0 for, 1 against
The thread, comment by comment
Each row is a top-level comment and its replies, in HN's order. Select a cell to open that comment on HN.
positive neutral or mixed critical about another commenter or something else the maker
What HN said
What people liked
Valuable preservation of public-domain data
From 2 comments
Wonderful project. Thank you for the preservation!
Barbing on HNJust an incredible service. Really appreciate that you put all of your backend work into the open.
3eb7988a1663 on HN
Trend and change analysis views are interesting
From 2 comments
This is crazy: https://cia-factbook-archive.fly.dev/analysis/changes
freakynit on HNWhoh. >Albania Faces Europe's Sharpest Population Decline as Emigration Surges Just one example of an article I didn't see and never would have thought to look for without that…
Barbing on HN
Objections
Country link and search bugs (FIPS vs ISO codes) now fixed by maker
From 3 comments
Hi. Nice project. One issue though; if you go to the Factbook for any year[1], the link to the entry for “Germany”[2] will take you to the entry for the Gambia for every year I…
roysting on HNHi, thanks for this! Not sure if you're aware that clicking Australia goes to American Samoa, similar issue with some others that I encountered (Bahamas -> Burkina faso).
ix101 on HNfound a bug: Australia links to American Samoa in 2025 archive.
daveelkan on HN
Charts and population totals had parsing and double-count bugs
From 2 comments
There is a bug in the time series charts. Data needs to be normalized prior to charting. For example:…
kshri24 on HNCool project. The world population seems to be double counted. I think https://cia-factbook-archive.fly.dev/analysis/trends
eddythompson80 on HN
Site is hard to read due to small gray text and low contrast
From 1 comment
This is one of the hardest sites I’ve ever tried to read. The pages are dense blocks of tiny gray serif text with default line height and almost no visual hierarchy. It feels…
dbg31415 on HN
Slow loading for some users
From 1 comment
Site loads very slowly for me. Tried various devices and networks. Same for a friend of mine overseas.
nubg on HN
Requests
Bulk download of all data
From 1 comment
Any way to download them all at once?
celeryd on HN
Light mode option
From 1 comment
This is fantastic! I would greatly appreciate an optional light mode / non-dark mode. I know a lot of folks love dark mode, but I find it very hard to read. Thanks so much for…
oxfeed65261 on HN
Show border and political changes over time
From 1 comment
I like the timeline feature. Maybe I need to spend more time, but to see political changes / borders / etc. would all be great! Keep up the good work.
ronald_petty on HN
Share the corrected database and code mappings
From 1 comment
To the author: In case you are patching fields/bugs in database (like country codes for example), would it be possible for you to share that database as well with us so we can…
freakynit on HN
Questions
Copyright status of the data
From 1 comment
What is its copyright status?
nephihaha on HN
Whether the archive remains relevant after Wikipedia
From 1 comment
Was it still relevant after Wikipedia? Honest question. edit: I mean, not the archive, that's golden! But a branch of usa propaganda being the stop gap provider on geographic data.
iririririr on HN
Alternatives named
factbook/cache.factbook.json GitHub repository
From 1 comment
There is a github of the factbook for anyone that just wants JSON or markdown files:=> https://github.com/factbook "A cache for datasets for the country profiles from the World…
1659447091 on HN
Internet Archive and Wayback Machine copies
From 2 comments
Glad I was able to get the original fact book data that other archivists have gathered over the years- Project Gutenberg (plain text), Wayback Machine (HTML zips and…
MilkMp on HNInternet Archive has 2025-2026 in their possession, should make it into OpenLibrary eventually once scanned.
toomuchtodo on HN
Wikipedia
From 2 comments
Hmm. It's kind of weird, because I think I actually used it in the 1990s, probably shortly before Wikipedia emerged. Ever since Wikipedia, I don't think I used the CIA world…
shevy-java on HNWas it still relevant after Wikipedia? Honest question. edit: I mean, not the archive, that's golden! But a branch of usa propaganda being the stop gap provider on geographic data.
iririririr on HN