All the electronics distributors on Octopart send us data directly. We have direct business relationships with all of the distributors on Octopart.
This data is any and all lifecycle information that we get for a component. This can come from the manufacturer or distributor. This data is normalized to reflect Octopart’s commonly used terms.
This data comes from the component manufacturer only. Since the manufacturer is the owner of their product, we believe that this is the more valuable type of lifecycle data. As such, we do not normalize the data, but pass the manufacturer's exact language on to our users without modification.
Data that is adjusted to reflect more commonly used terms.
The data on our website is updated continuously. We receive stock and pricing information from most distributors once a day.
When you click from a part on Octopart to an electronic distributor's website, we receive a small fee from the distributor.
As a free service, Octopart relies on sponsorship from advertisers including distributors and manufacturers. Octopart is also supported by other forms of advertising. These include:
Octopart also sells aggregated usage reports including "Top Product" and "Most Searched" style reports. These are anonymous and feature data collected in aggregate of people using Octopart.
The order of part results when you search on Octopart is organic and is not paid. Our search algorithm considers the data we have on each part as well as how well the query terms match certain part data. This algorithm is designed to return the best possible parts for each search. The order of those parts is not influenced by payment to Octopart.
The default order of distributors is influenced by a number of factors, such as quantity in stock, the data they provide us, and advertiser rates paid by the distributor.
To be clear, these factors only influence default placement of distributors in the offer table beneath the product. They do not influence the original search result set of returned products (MPNs) as defined in the previous section.
Octopart makes use of cookies to help us administer and improve the quality of Octopart, to analyze usage, and to serve relevant ads. Refer to Octopart's Privacy Policy for additional information.
No, an account is not required to use Octopart, but we recommend it! You can save preferences like your country, your preferred currency, save BOMs in the BOM Tool, and save your favorite distributors.
Octopart was started by three Ph.D. students studying physics who were frustrated by how hard it was to find electronic components and compare prices between distributors. They founded Octopart in 2006 to open up access to part data for design, sourcing, and manufacturing.
No. Octopart is a search engine for electronic parts. While we have information on over 40 million parts on our site, we don't have our own warehouse or stock of parts. You can buy parts from the distributors that we link to, though! To buy a part from a distributor, click the blue "Buy Now" link or the distributor's SKU next to the distributor's name.
No, we are not owned by any manufacturer or distributor. In 2015, we became a wholly owned subsidiary of Altium, an electronics design software company, and continue to grow and operate independently from our headquarters in New York City.
If you know of a distributor who stocks the part and they're not on our list of distributors, please let that distributor know about Octopart and suggest that they list their inventory with us. If you think that a distributor on our list has it in stock but it's not showing up on Octopart, please email us.
Yes. Octopart is powered by the Nexar Legacy API.
Please email contact@octopart.com.
We receive data files from distributors on a daily basis so usually the quantity in stock will closely reflect the distributor's stock. If there seems to be a major discrepancy, please let us know and we'll look into it.
If you love electronics and think you could help us improve our service, check our jobs page and send us an email!
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Please contact our business team.