# Microsoft Academic Search

> former academic search engine

**Wikidata**: [Q1065154](https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q1065154)  
**Wikipedia**: [English](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Academic_Search)  
**Source**: https://4ort.xyz/entity/microsoft-academic-search

## Summary
Microsoft Academic Search (MAS) was a free public search engine and bibliographic database for academic publications and researchers. It was developed and maintained by Microsoft Research before being decommissioned in 2016. The platform ceased content updates in 2012 and was eventually replaced by a successor product, Microsoft Academic.

## Key Facts
- **Entity Type**: Website, bibliographic database, search engine.
- **Operator & Owner**: Operated by Microsoft Research; owned by Microsoft.
- **URL**: `http://academic.research.microsoft.com/` (archived).
- **End of Updates**: The service stopped adding new content in **2012**.
- **Dissolved**: The platform was decommissioned in late **2016**.
- **Successor**: Replaced by **Microsoft Academic** around May 2016.
- **Identifiers**: Freebase ID `/m/02rdlwg`; Semantic Scholar Topic ID `432350`.
- **Coverage**: Cited in academic literature, such as *The Number of Scholarly Documents on the Public Web* (PLoS ONE).

## FAQs

### Q: Is Microsoft Academic Search still active?
A: No. Microsoft Academic Search was decommissioned in late 2016 and is no longer active. It stopped indexing new content in 2012.

### Q: What replaced Microsoft Academic Search?
A: It was replaced by **Microsoft Academic**, a new scholarly search tool released by Microsoft in May 2016, which utilized different AI technologies.

### Q: Who operated Microsoft Academic Search?
A: The platform was operated and maintained by **Microsoft Research**, the research division of the Microsoft Corporation.

### Q: When was Microsoft Academic Search active?
A: Archived versions of the website date back to 2009. The service continued to exist until its decommissioning in 2016, though new content additions ceased in 2012.

## Why It Matters
Microsoft Academic Search served as an early attempt by a major technology corporation to organize and provide free access to the world's scholarly literature. As a predecessor to Microsoft Academic, it represented a significant step in applying semantic search and knowledge extraction techniques to academic data. The project allowed researchers to discover publications, explore citation networks, and analyze academic trends without the paywalls common to other databases at the time. While it attracted limited bibliometric research compared to its successor and competitors, it laid the operational and conceptual groundwork for modern academic discovery tools developed by Microsoft. Its eventual decommissioning highlighted the rapid evolution of academic search technologies.

## Notable For
- Serving as the direct predecessor to the AI-driven **Microsoft Academic** platform.
- Being one of the early "big tech" entrants into the specialized field of academic search and bibliometrics.
- Operating as a free resource that functioned as both a **search engine** and a **bibliographic database**.
- Being indexed and recognized as a distinct entity in knowledge bases like **Semantic Scholar** and **Freebase**.

## Body

### Overview
Microsoft Academic Search was a website and search engine dedicated to indexing scholarly literature. It provided tools for searching across academic papers, authors, and institutional affiliations. The service was part of the broader research initiatives undertaken by Microsoft.

### Ownership and Operation
The platform was fully owned by **Microsoft**, the American multinational technology corporation. Day-to-day operation and maintenance were handled by **Microsoft Research**, the company's dedicated research arm.

### Operational Timeline
- **Inception**: Archived records indicate the site was active as early as September 5, 2009.
- **Cessation of Updates**: Microsoft stopped adding new data to the Microsoft Academic Search database in **2012**.
- **Decommissioning**: The service was officially shut down and decommissioned toward the end of **2016**.
- **Replacement**: In May 2016, Microsoft launched a new tool, **Microsoft Academic**, effectively replacing the older search engine.

### Technical Details
- **URL**: The service was hosted at `http://academic.research.microsoft.com/`.
- **Nature of Service**: It was classified as a bibliographic database and an academic search engine.
- **Web Presence**: The project page was described at `https://web.archive.org/web/20140225095910/http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/projects/academic/`.

## References

1. [Source](https://web.archive.org/web/20140225095910/http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/projects/academic/)
2. The coverage of Microsoft Academic: Analyzing the publication output of a university
3. AI science search engines expand their reach
4. The Number of Scholarly Documents on the Public Web
5. Freebase Data Dumps. 2013
6. [Microsoft Academic Search | Semantic Scholar](https://www.semanticscholar.org/topic/Microsoft-Academic-Search/432350)