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Find and research charities for grants

Over 1.5 million 501(c)(3) charitable organizations are registered in the United States. How do you find effective charities that are aligned with your favorite causes and giving goals? Consider the following resources for your research.

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Center for Disaster Philanthropy

The Center for Disaster Philanthropy (CDP) is a dedicated resource to help DAFgiving360™ donors make more thoughtful disaster granting decisions and maximize the impact of their gifts.

Candid

Search Candid (formerly GuideStar) for up-to-date data on nonprofits which includes program descriptions, financial information, and supplementary information for a wide range of charities. Candid’s search function allows you to find an organization by keyword, city, state, zip, nonprofit category, revenue range or employer identification number (EIN).

Charity Navigator

Charity Navigator allows you to search charities through a variety of criteria including category, topic, Employer Identification Number (EIN), and more. Charity Navigator provides in depth information about their rating methodology as well lists of charities sorted by cause.

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Council on Foundations

Community foundations know and serve the communities where they are located, seek support from the public, and administer funds from various donors in a defined geographic area, typically no larger than a state. Donors can give to a community foundation with confidence their donations will be distributed to impactful nonprofits that support causes within a specific community. The Council on Foundations has an interactive map that helps you locate community foundations across the U.S.

IRS – Internal Revenue Service

Donor-advised funds facilitate grants to eligible 501(c)(3) charitable organizations, as recommended by donors. DAFgiving360 and other donor-advised funds rely on a variety of sources, including the IRS and other federal and state regulators to determine eligibility status. The IRS offers a Tax Exempt Organizations Search where you can find organizations eligible to receive tax-deductible charitable contributions and those whose tax-exempt status has been revoked. If an organization is ineligible for any reason or under active investigation by the IRS, state regulators or law enforcement, DAFgiving360 may suspend any grant recommendations until the investigation is concluded and the organization regains its 501(c)(3) charitable status.

We encourage people with concerns about the activities of any charitable organization to contact the IRS or state regulators. To contact the IRS, you may use Form 13909, Tax-Exempt Organization Complaint (Referral) Form. Visit IRS >

NASCO – National Association of State Charity Officials

NASCO is composed of attorneys general, secretaries of state and other state officials charged with the oversight of charitable organizations. NASCO tracks legal actions against charities, including a group of fraudulent charities that claimed to serve veterans and service members. We encourage people with concerns about the activities of any charitable organization to contact the IRS or state regulators. NASCO maintains a list of state contacts on its web site. Visit NASCO >

Couldn’t find your charity of choice?

If you had difficulties locating your charitable organization in the databases above, enter the charity’s information in your grant recommendation and DAFgiving360 will research the charity’s eligibility.

FAQs

Try searching for location, activity, or revenue, because the IRS (and the charitable organizations themselves) often abbreviates names, making a keyword search more difficult.

There are several reasons an organization may not appear in a database.

It may not be an IRS-registered 501(c)(3) organization eligible to accept tax-deductible contributions.
It may be registered under a different name with the IRS. For instance, GuideStar is registered under the name “Philanthropic Research, Inc.”
It may be considered a religious entity and is therefore not required to file with the IRS for tax-exempt status.
It may be a program associated with a larger organization and not have its own listing.
It may no longer be a 501(c)(3) organization, having lost its IRS status or gone out of business.
It may be a new charity that has not been entered in the database yet.

If you had difficulties locating your charitable organization in the databases above, enter the charity’s information in your grant recommendation and DAFgiving360 will research the charity’s eligibility.

Try limiting your search by choosing the largest revenue range. If nothing comes up, choose the next highest range.

Some databases may not include your religious organization because religious entities are not required to file with the IRS for tax-exempt status. Only a fraction of American houses of worship have applied for formal IRS tax-exempt status.

Even if a charity is not listed in the databases above, you can still recommend a grant if the organization is a qualified U.S.-based public charity.

As a safeguard, before a grant can be given to a particular charity, DAFgiving360 helps determine if that charity meets basic qualifications. If you'd like to contribute to a charity that is not yet in our system, simply enter the charity's information in your grant recommendation and DAFgiving360 will research the charity's eligibility.