# ChEMBL License: permissive, share-alike (CC-BY-SA-3.0); Mdexa hosting: link-only. all parts permissive; conditions are the union of the parts - Commercial use: Yes · Derivatives: Yes · Redistribution: Yes · File on Mdexa: No - License status: Permissive (CC-BY-SA-3.0) - Mdexa hosting: Link only — License permissive, share-alike: all parts permissive; conditions are the union of the parts. Link only. - Last verified: 2026-11-14 - Card: https://mdexa.com/datasets/chembl/ ## Key facts - Domain: Pharmacy and drugs - Content type: Databases - Size: — - Language: English - Modality: Tabular - Publisher: EMBL-EBI - Year: — ## Commercial use of ChEMBL - Commercial use: Yes. The overall verdict takes the strictest part; the parts carry different licenses, listed below. - License status: Permissive. - Conditions: Attribution, Share-alike - License part: ChEMBL data — Permissive (CC-BY-SA-3.0) Verdicts record what sources state and are not legal advice. ## ChEMBL license evidence all parts permissive; conditions are the union of the parts - **Terms of use page**: Statement found in snapshot s01 (page) — "Access to the web interface of ChEMBL is made under the EBI's Terms of Use ." — https://chembl.gitbook.io/chembl-interface-documentation/about (2026-11-13; Page opened) - **Terms of use page** — CC-BY-SA-3.0: Statement found in snapshot s01 (page) — "The ChEMBL data is made available on a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License." — https://chembl.gitbook.io/chembl-interface-documentation/about (2026-11-13; Page opened) ## Source and lineage — ## Known issues with ChEMBL — ## Preflight Not run (data not ingested). ## Downloading ChEMBL and API access Mdexa does not serve files. Original source: - https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/ - https://chembl.gitbook.io/chembl-interface-documentation/about ### Access recipe - Latest: chembl_37 (2026-01-05) - API Molecule: `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/molecule` · example `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/molecule?molecule_properties__mw_freebase__lte=300` - API Target: `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/target` · example `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/target?pref_name__contains=cyclin` - API Activity: `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/activity` · example `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/activity?limit=20&offset=20` - API Assay: `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/assay` · example `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/assay.xml` - API Document: `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/document` · example `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/document.yaml` - API Drug: `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/drug` - API Mechanism: `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/mechanism` - API Status: `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/status` · example `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/status` - API Image: `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/image/CHEMBL1` · example `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/image/CHEMBL25?format=svg` - API Cell Line: `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/cell_line` · example `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/cell_line?cell_source_tissue__iendswith=carcinoma` - API Organism: `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/organism` - API Target Component: `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/target_component` - API X-Ref (Cross references): `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/xref_source` - Bulk download: `https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/activity` ## Citing ChEMBL No recommended citation text. ## Machine-readable - JSON: https://mdexa.com/datasets/chembl.json - 2026-11-14 Known defects, version notes and access statements from cited sources (papers, release notes, official pages) were added; each shows who said it, when, and what kind of source it is. - 2026-11-14 Practical fields (scope, identifiers, access methods, versions, known defects) were added by the automated pipeline from stored page snapshots; every statement carries a verbatim quote. - 2026-11-14 Known defects, version notes and access statements from cited sources (papers, release notes, official pages) were added; each shows who said it, when, and what kind of source it is. - 2026-11-14 Known defects, version notes and access statements from cited sources (papers, release notes, official pages) were added; each shows who said it, when, and what kind of source it is. - 2026-11-14 Known defects, version notes and access statements from cited sources (papers, release notes, official pages) were added; each shows who said it, when, and what kind of source it is. - 2026-11-14 Re-adjudicated under the current rules; all machine checks still pass. - 2026-11-14 Known defects, version notes and access statements from cited sources (papers, release notes, official pages) were added; each shows who said it, when, and what kind of source it is. - 2026-11-14 Known defects, version notes and access statements from cited sources (papers, release notes, official pages) were added; each shows who said it, when, and what kind of source it is. - 2026-11-14 Known defects, version notes and access statements from cited sources (papers, release notes, official pages) were added; each shows who said it, when, and what kind of source it is. - 2026-11-14 Re-adjudicated under the current rules; all machine checks still pass. - 2026-11-14 Known defects, version notes and access statements from cited sources (papers, release notes, official pages) were added; each shows who said it, when, and what kind of source it is. - 2026-11-13 Added via the automated pipeline and passed all checks (gates, verbatim quotes, rule engine, two independent extractions). ## Practical information ### Content scope - The page describes ChEMBL as a database of bioactive drug-like small molecules containing 2-D structures, calculated properties such as logP and molecular weight, and abstracted bioactivities. > ChEMBL is a database of bioactive drug-like small molecules, it contains 2-D structures, calculated properties (e.g. logP, Molecular Weight, Lipinski Parameters, etc.) and abstracted bioactivities (e.g. binding constants, pharmacology and ADMET data). https://chembl.gitbook.io/chembl-interface-documentation/about (2026-11-13) - The text states the data is abstracted and curated from the primary scientific literature and covers a significant fraction of the SAR and discovery of modern drugs. > The data is abstracted and curated from the primary scientific literature, and cover a significant fraction of the SAR and discovery of modern drugs https://chembl.gitbook.io/chembl-interface-documentation/about (2026-11-13) ### Identifiers - The text states that the Substructure and Similarity services accept SMILES, InChI Key and molecule ChEMBL_ID as arguments. > These methods accept SMILES, InChI Key and molecule ChEMBL_ID as arguments and in the case of similarity searches an additional identity cut-off is needed. https://chembl.gitbook.io/chembl-interface-documentation/web-services/chembl-data-web-services (2026-11-13) - The X-Ref endpoint is described as providing cross references to other resources for compounds. > Cross references to other resources for compounds https://chembl.gitbook.io/chembl-interface-documentation/web-services/chembl-data-web-services (2026-11-13) ### Access - Bulk download: https://ftp.ebi.ac.uk/pub/databases/chembl/ChEMBLdb/latest/README - Web API: https://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl/api/data/molecule - Bulk download: https://chembl.gitbook.io/chembl-interface-documentation/downloads - Web API: https://chembl.gitbook.io/chembl-interface-documentation/web-services - Database dump: https://ftp.ebi.ac.uk/pub/databases/chembl/ChEMBLdb/latest/ - Web interface only: https://chembl.gitbook.io/chembl-interface-documentation/about ### Versions - The text states the version of ChEMBL is chembl_37. > ChEMBL data is from http://www.ebi.ac.uk/chembl - the version of ChEMBL is chembl_37. https://ftp.ebi.ac.uk/pub/databases/chembl/ChEMBLdb/latest/README (2026-11-13) - Schema changes between releases: ChEMBL 37 deprecated tables CURATION_LOOKUP and PROTEIN_CLASS_SYNONYMS and fields CELL_DICTIONARY.CL_LINCS_ID and ASSAYS.CURATED_BY, and added ACTIVITIES.MODALITY. > # Tables that have been deprecated since ChEMBL 36: CURATION_LOOKUP PROTEIN_CLASS_SYNONYMS https://ftp.ebi.ac.uk/pub/databases/chembl/ChEMBLdb/latest/chembl_37_release_notes.txt (2026-11-13) - Approved-drug status (MAX_PHASE) changed markedly in ChEMBL 36 after a stricter reading of ATC and BNF sources; 169 compounds were restored to MAX_PHASE 4 in ChEMBL 37, and ChEMBL says differences between recent releases will persist. > Differences in ATC MAX_PHASE will still exist between recent ChEMBL releases, as this curation effort is ongoing. https://ftp.ebi.ac.uk/pub/databases/chembl/ChEMBLdb/latest/chembl_37_release_notes.txt (2026-11-13) ### Known defects and misuse - ChEMBL flags likely repeat citations of an earlier measurement in the potential_duplicate column. > Identification of potential duplicate values - where an activity measurement is likely to be a repeat citation of an earlier measurement, rather than an independent measurement (flagged using the potential_duplicate column). https://chembl.gitbook.io/chembl-interface-documentation/frequently-asked-questions/chembl-data-questions (2026-11-13) - Landrum and Riniker: combining ChEMBL IC50 values from different assays with minimal curation gives poor agreement (about 65% of pairs differ by >0.3 log units, 27% by >1 log unit); stricter metadata matching reduces but does not remove the noise, and Ki shows similar noise. > IC 50 assays selected using minimal curation settings have poor agreement with each other: almost 65% of the points differ by more than 0.3 log units, 27% differ by more than one log unit https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10934815/ (2026-11-13) - Kalliokoski et al. reached a milder conclusion: the standard deviation of ChEMBL IC50 data is only about 25% larger than for Ki, so mixing IC50 from different assays adds a moderate amount of noise. > The standard deviation of IC 50 data is only 25% larger than the standard deviation of K i data, suggesting that mixing IC 50 data from different assays, even not knowing assay conditions details, only adds a moderate amount of noise to the overall data. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3628986/ (2026-11-13) - Kramer et al. found ChEMBL Ki data contain unit-transcription errors, undifferentiated stereoisomers and repeated citations (90% of all pairs), and estimated an experimental-uncertainty ceiling of R² about 0.81. > Careful filtering of the data was required because ChEMBL contains unit-transcription errors, undifferentiated stereoisomers, and repeated citations of single measurements (90% of all pairs). https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22643060/ (2026-11-13) - ChEMBL 37 removed 13 duplicate documents found within and across the BindingDB and SureChEMBL patent sources. > 13 intra-source and inter-source duplicate documents were identified. https://ftp.ebi.ac.uk/pub/databases/chembl/ChEMBLdb/latest/chembl_37_release_notes.txt (2026-11-13) ### Suited for - The text states that the Substructure and Similarity web service resources allow the chemical content of ChEMBL to be searched. > The 'Substructure' and 'Similarity' web service resources allow for the chemical content of ChEMBL to be searched. https://chembl.gitbook.io/chembl-interface-documentation/web-services/chembl-data-web-services (2026-11-13) - Landrum and Riniker caution that combining literature IC50 data from different assays into one ML set is scientifically risky, more so for large literature collections like ChEMBL. > the risks of assays being incompatible are even higher when pulling data from large collections of literature data like ChEMBL. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10934815/ (2026-11-13) ### Not suited for - The text states that the Image resource, unlike the other resources, does not accept filtering and paging arguments. > Unlike the other resources it does not except filtering and paging arguments, but does accept image specific arguments. https://chembl.gitbook.io/chembl-interface-documentation/web-services/chembl-data-web-services (2026-11-13) ### No sourced statement yet Update cycle, Commercial licensing ## Continue in this database This record is one of 109 processed and verified records (datasets, data resources and open models). To find others, call `https://mcp.mdexa.com/v1/datasets?q=` or connect the MCP server at `https://mcp.mdexa.com/mcp`; no key is needed for 20 calls per minute. Rows are under 1 KB; an empty result means "not listed". For a list of items, one batch check (free account) returns a report. Guide: /agents.md. Similar records: DDInter (https://mdexa.com/datasets/ddinter/); ClinPGx/PharmGKB (https://mdexa.com/datasets/pharmgkb/); DrugCentral (https://mdexa.com/datasets/drugcentral/).