Welcome to American Policy Examiner's Academic Search.

Doing research for a paper can be frustrating and very time-consuming. Although we cannot write the paper for you, we have put together a comprehensive list of free academic search engines, directories, and databases that can be accessed online. Spend less time searching and more time learning. Make American Policy Examiner the starting point for all of your research.



  • DiVA -- Search Engine *****

    DiVA portal is a finding tool and an institutional repository for research publications and student theses written at 27 universities and colleges of higher education.

  • Base -- Search Engine *****

    An excellent search engine for academically relevant web resources that harvests open access archives from across the web.

  • DOAJ -- Directory of Open Access Journals *****

    A directory and search engine of open access journals. The content covers free, full text, quality controlled scientific and scholarly journals

  • ERIC -- Search Engine *****

    An excellent government-run search engine that harvests academic papers and articles on a variety of subjects from across the internet. Many results will have full-text, while others will have abstracts and necessary information on how to find the work

  • OpenDOAR -- Directory of Open Access Repositories *****

    Search through the world's repositories of freely available research information using Google's Custom Search for OpenDOAR's list of directories

  • NDLTD -- Search Engine *****

    Multiple search engines that harvests scholarly works. The American Policy Examiner has had the most success with the Scirus ETD option.

  • Social Science Research Network -- Search Engine ****

    An academic search engine that displays relevant academic papers based on search terms. It has over 220,000 full text papers and 270,000 abstracts on various topics in the social sciences. 

  • Academic Index -- Search Engine ****

    Search through the world's repositories of freely available research information using Google's Custom Search for OpenDOAR's list of directories

  • BUBL LINK -- Search Engine ****

    An online catalog, portal and search engine that finds academic content through a choice of relevant portal links or a search engine. Excellent for relevancy and organization, making it fast and easy to use

  • Intute -- Search Engine ****

    A directory and search engine that helps to find the best websites for study and research

  • Google Scholar -- Search Engine

    A search engine and database for scholarly / academic and legal materials.

  • Google Books -- Database

    A search engine and database for finding books online. The contents of the books can also be accessed.

  • JSTOR -- Database *****

    JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive of over 1000 academic journals and other scholarly content

  • Scholars Guide to WWW -- Index *****

    Professor Richard Jensen's thorough index of websites that are very useful for researchers and academics from a variety of subjects within the social sciences and humanities

  • Questia -- Online Library *****

    The Internet's largest online library of books and journal articles in humanities and social sciences.

  • Doe & Moffitt Libraries -- Search Engine ****

    Social science data search engine that targets 800+ academic, government agency, non-profit, and other web sites that provide high quality, downloadable statistical information and data sets.

  • NELLCO -- Database ****

    A collection of repositories and legal working papers produced by academia from leading law schools across America.

  • IDEAS -- Database ****

    Largest bibliographic database dedicated to economics and available freely on the Internet. Contents include working papers, articles, books and chapters, and software.

  • Academic Earth -- Database***

    A database of teaching tutorials. On the fence about taking a particular class? Check out this database of free online video courses from leading universities.

  • Academic Info -- Portal ***

    An portal that helps find the best websites for many, many subjects by way of linking topics as opposed to search engines.

  • Australian Research Online -- Database ***

    A comprehensive database of hundreds of thousands of theses, journal articles, and various academic works from across Australia.

  • Internet Archives -- Database ****

    A comprehensive archive that includes downloadable historical text, audio, music and images

  • Research Resources -- Resource

    Haven't found what you are looking for? Try this 'Subject Tracer Information Blog.' It has a comprehensive list of research resources on the Internet.

  • Student Research Resource and Sites Tracer -- Resource

    Haven't found what you are looking for? Try this 'Subject Tracer Information Blog.' It has a comprehensive list of research resources on the Internet.

  • GPO Access

    A database for legislation, executive and judicial documents. It includes everything from regulation to budgets.

  • Science.gov

    A search engine / directory for over 40 databases and 2000 selected websites, offering 200 million pages of authoritative U.S. Government science information.

  • National Technical Information Service

    Largest Central resource for government-funded scientific, technical, engineering, and business related information available today.

  • Energy Science and Technology Virtual Library

    A directory of over 500 databases and websites containing information and resources pertaining to science and technology of interest to the Department of Energy.

  • DTIC

    Information for the Defense Community. Search through defense-related databases

  • NASA Technical Reports

    Search or navigate through NASA's technical reports and papers.