The National Patterns statistics draw primarily from NCSES's annual national surveys of the R&D expenditures and funding of the organizations that perform the bulk of U.S. R&D. These organizations include the business sector, federal and nonfederal government, higher education, and nonprofit organizations. Each of these sectors is summarized-including links to other sections of the NCSES website with specifics on survey coverage, data collected, and survey implementation-in the sections below.

For 2019-24, annual data on the R&D performed in the domestic United States by the business sector come from the NCSES Business Enterprise Research and Development (BERD) Survey, covering companies with 10 or more employees, and the Annual Business Survey (ABS), covering companies with 9 or fewer employees. BERD and ABS are conducted for NCSES by the Census Bureau in accordance with an agreement between the two agencies. BERD is a sample survey representing for-profit, publicly or privately held companies with 10 or more employees in the United States that performed or funded R&D either domestically or abroad in the manufacturing, mining, utilities, wholesale trade, transportation, information, or services industries. ABS is a sample survey of for-profit employer companies with a U.S. presence engaged in the mining, utilities, construction, manufacturing, wholesale trade, retail trade, or services industries. For the R&D statistics presented in this report, the ABS covers only businesses in the manufacturing, wholesale, and information sectors and the scientific R&D services industries with 1-9 employees.

The 2024 estimated business R&D expenditures in this report are based on 2024 projected R&D reported on the 2023 BERD Survey and trends for business R&D performance. Some of the variation in BERD R&D estimates across survey years is due to changes in individual respondent reporting practices. During the 2023 BERD data collection of 2023 R&D expenditures and projected 2024 R&D expenditures, some respondents revised their reporting practices and eliminated expenditures that did not meet the BERD definition of R&D. This has resulted in a meaningful decrease in the preliminary 2023 U.S. R&D performance compared to the amount of 2023 R&D performance that would have been estimated based on respondent reporting practices used in 2022 and earlier prior reporting patterns. The 2023 business R&D expenditures reported here are adjusted to this lower and more accurate R&D expenditure amount. This change has affected the comparability of the 2023 and 2024 estimates to those published for years prior to 2023.

For 2017 and 2018, the source of the data for companies with 10 or more employees was the Business R&D Survey (BRDS), a predecessor to the BERD Survey, with similar survey characteristics and coverage. ABS was again the source of data on companies with 9 or fewer employees in both of these years.

From 2008 to 2016, the primary data source on business R&D was the NCSES Business R&D and Innovation Survey (BRDIS), a predecessor of both BERD and BRDS. In a salient difference, BRDIS was designed to be nationally representative of all for-profit companies with 5 or more employees. In 2016, a companion survey, the Business R&D and Innovation Survey-Microbusiness (BRDI-M), provided statistics on the R&D activities that year of businesses with 1-4 employees. Prior to the 2016 data year, statistics on the R&D of these "micro" businesses (typically less than $3 billion annually) were neither available nor reported in the business R&D totals in National Patterns.

As noted, BERD, BRDS, and BRDIS are related surveys. With regard to R&D, the topical coverage has been similar: R&D performance (in the United States and worldwide); total and R&D employment (in the United States and worldwide); sources of R&D funding; type of R&D activities (basic research, applied research, development); type of R&D costs; R&D capital expenditures; R&D application and technology focus areas; geographic location (within the United States and in foreign countries); sales (in the United States and worldwide); and patenting, licensing, other technology transfer activities. The ABS and BRDI-M Survey provided R&D performance and funding data compatible with those for the larger companies.

For 2007 and earlier years, the data come from the NCSES Survey of Industrial Research and Development (SIRD), the predecessor to BRDIS. SIRD was also a sample survey, conducted annually (1953-2007), that provided national estimates of the R&D performed within the United States by industrial firms, whether U.S. or foreign-owned. The SIRD target population consisted (same as BRDIS) of all for-profit companies with 5 or more employees, manufacturing and nonmanufacturing, that performed R&D in the United States. Data on the R&D of companies with fewer than 5 employees were not available throughout this period.

(Note: Data on business intramural R&D capital, as reported by BRDIS and its follow-on surveys, are not included as a component in the National Patterns total of business intramural R&D.)

Federal intramural R&D. For fiscal years prior to FY 2024, data on the intramural R&D performed by the federal government come from the NCSES Survey of Federal Funds for Research and Development (Fed Funds for R&D), which is completed annually by all federal agencies conducting R&D programs (approximately 33 federal departments or independent agencies). In FY 2024, the data source for federal intramural R&D expenditures changed from the NCSES Survey of Federal Funds for Research and Development to the NCSES Federal Facilities Research and Development Survey. For differences in methodology, see the respective survey pages and NSF 25-305, New Survey Shows R&D Performance Within Federal Facilities Totaled $34.5 Billion in FY 2022.^​

Federally funded R&D centers (FFRDCs). The nation's FFRDCs are a second venue of federal R&D performance. (Currently, there are 42 FFRDCs, although the number can change from year to year; NCSES maintains a Master Government List of the population of FFRDCs, which it regularly updates.) FFRDCs are R&D-performing organizations administered by an industrial firm, a university, a nonprofit institution, or a consortium but that have funding exclusively or substantially from the federal government. An FFRDC is operated to provide R&D capability to serve an agency's mission objectives or, in some cases, to provide major facilities at universities for research and training purposes. Since FY 2001, NCSES's FFRDC Research and Development Survey (known previously as the Survey of Research and Development Expenditures at FFRDCs) has provided annual data (by federal fiscal year) on the R&D expenditures (with additional detail) of all the nation's FFRDCs. Prior to FY 2001, R&D expenditure data for the FFRDCs were collected as part of the major performer surveys: the Survey of R&D Expenditures at Universities and Colleges (for university-administered FFRDCs), the SIRD (for industry-administered FFRDCs), and the Fed Funds for R&D Survey (for nonprofit-administered FFRDCs).

The category of nonfederal government R&D performance included in National Patterns is the intramural R&D of state governments (i.e., the R&D performance of state agency and department employees and the services performed by others in support of internal R&D projects). Data on this state intramural R&D come from the NCSES Survey of State Government Research and Development. This state survey is a comparatively recent NCSES initiative, with the first data year in FY 2006.

In addition, the BERD, FFRDC, and Higher Education Research and Development (HERD) Surveys (see sections above and below) provide detail on R&D funding by nonfederal governments other than just state governments.

For academic FY 2010 and onward, data on the R&D performed in higher education come from the NCSES HERD Survey. HERD is an annual census of universities and colleges that grant a bachelor's degree or higher and expend at least $150,000 in separately accounted-for R&D during the fiscal year of these academic institutions. The survey collects information on R&D expenditures by field of research, source of funds, and type of R&D, as well as on head counts of R&D personnel.

The HERD Survey replaced the earlier Survey of Research and Development Expenditures at Universities and Colleges. For data years FY 2009 and earlier, the Universities and Colleges Survey provided the data on academic R&D.

This sector refers to R&D performed in the United States by nonprofit organizations other than government or academia. The most recent data on nonprofit organization R&D come from the NCSES FY 2022 Nonprofit Research Activities (NPRA) module of the Annual Business Survey and the 2016 NPRA Survey. Data for 2017-19 are estimated based on the 2016 NPRA Survey and NPRA 2022 Survey revisions to 2020 data. The 1998-2015 data for nonprofit organization R&D funded by the federal government come from the NCSES annual Survey of Federal Funds for Research and Development; data for nonprofit organization R&D funded by businesses and by the nonprofit sector itself for that period are estimated based on parameters from the 1996-97 Survey of Research and Development Funding and Performance by Nonprofit Organizations, which was also conducted in 1973. Data for years prior to 1973 come from earlier National Patterns reports (which reflect, in part, surveys in 1957 and 1960).

Some of the trend analyses in National Patterns draw on National Income and Product Accounts data (e.g., U.S. gross domestic product [GDP], state domestic product) assembled by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Activity (BEA). For details on this U.S. economic data, see https://www.bea.gov/data/gdp.

In keeping with international conventions, U.S. R&D expenditures in current dollars are adjusted for inflation based on BEA's implicit GDP price deflator.

The National Patterns statistical picture of the U.S. R&D system is developed from integration of primary data from NCSES sectoral R&D surveys. Adjustments to the primary data are needed in some cases to increase their consistency. Furthermore, preliminary or otherwise estimated values may be used (and later revised) where final data from one or more of the surveys are not yet available but can reasonably be approximated.

Key features of the methodology include the following:

Data from the NCSES business R&D surveys (BERD, BRDS, BRDIS, ABS, BRDI-M, SIRD) have been reported on a calendar year basis and are incorporated directly in the National Patterns totals. Data from the Fed Funds for R&D Survey, the Federal Facilities Research and Development Survey, and the FFRDC Research and Development Survey are reported on a federal fiscal year basis (1 October-30 September the next year) and are adjusted to the calendar year for National Patterns integration. The data from the HERD Survey are reported on an academic fiscal year basis (typically, 1 July-30 June the next year) and converted to calendar year. Data from the Survey of State Government R&D are reported according to each state's fiscal year and are also converted to calendar year (presuming that 1 July-30 June the next year is typical).

NCSES annual surveys of business R&D (particularly BRDIS and SIRD) had long covered the population of private sector companies with 5 or more employees. Inclusion of the BRDI-M data in the National Patterns data on business R&D totals in 2016 expanded the covered population to include companies with 1-4 employees, thereby adding $4.8 billion of R&D to the total reported by BRDIS. BRDS data in 2017 and 2018 and subsequently BERD data from 2019 on covered the population of companies with 10 or more employees. Starting in 2017, ABS data covered companies with 1-9 employees in the National Patterns reported business R&D totals, accounting for $5.7 billion in 2017 and $5.7 billion in 2022.

The method for estimating the type of R&D performed (i.e., basic research, applied research, experimental development) in the business sector was revised for 1998 and later years. This change resulted in a net decrease in the proportion of business R&D classified as basic research. Accordingly, data for 1998 and later years are not directly comparable with data for 1997 and earlier years. The transition to BRDIS (data series starting in 2008) does not appear to have introduced further discontinuities in the type-of-R&D estimates. For universities and colleges, the type-of-R&D estimation method was revised in 1998 and again in 2010. Hence, the latest data for higher education are also not directly comparable to those reported in earlier years.

Estimates of the type of R&D by source of funding follow two different methods. For federal sources, estimates are based on survey responses for federal funding by type of R&D. For nonfederal funding sources, estimates are modeled using nonfederal funding sources of total R&D and the total nonfederally funded R&D by type. Because of this estimation procedure, comparisons of R&D type by funding source are not supported by statistical testing. National Patterns uses the general term "estimates" to describe survey estimates, modeled estimates, and projections. Results that combine these techniques are also called estimates because survey estimates are their major component.

The data for higher education in 2003 and later years include both science and engineering (S&E) and non-S&E fields. Prior to 2003, only S&E fields are included. Non-S&E R&D was $1.4 billion in FY 2003 and $7.6 billion in FY 2024. Similarly, for the business sector, social science R&D was not included until the 2008 data year, when it was $0.8 billion of the $290.7 billion business R&D total.

The data for higher education R&D have included, since 1998, a net-out adjustment for R&D funds reported by academic institutions as passed through to other academic subrecipients. This adjustment was recently expanded (back to 1998) to also include pass-throughs to all noneducational recipients (i.e., businesses, nonprofit organizations, and others). The effect of this expanded adjustment is that the annual totals of higher education R&D performance are about $0.4 billion lower in 1998, the first year for this adjustment, to about $2.5 billion lower annually in 2012-15 than previously have been reported in National Patterns. In addition, for the 2010-23 survey years, this more comprehensive pass-through funding adjustment has been further improved by tabulating the adjustments on an institution-by-institution basis, which allows for a more precise estimate of the original nonfederal sources of pass-through funds and better estimation of the type of R&D (basic, applied, or experimental development) being passed through to other R&D performers.

Data on federally funded R&D discussed in this report were derived from surveys of organizations that perform R&D, such as companies, universities, and FFRDCs. In the past, these amounts differed substantially from the R&D that federal agencies had reported funding. For example, in 2009, federal agencies reported obligating $141 billion for R&D funding to all R&D performers (including $53 billion to the business sector), compared with an estimated $127 billion in federal funding reported by all performers of R&D that year ($40 billion by businesses). More recently, with improvements in the methods for the survey of federal funding and adoption of revised R&D definitions, this effect has become less apparent.

From 2016 forward, the data on federal intramural R&D explicitly exclude expenditures for pre-production development. (Pre-production development is nonexperimental work on a product or system before it goes into full production, e.g., activities and programs that are categorized as operational system development in the Department of Defense's Research, Development, Test and Evaluation [RDT&E] budget activity structure.) This change aligns the federal intramural data with a recent change introduced in the definition of R&D by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget. In FYs 2016-18, pre-production development for federal intramural R&D totaled between $5 billion and $7 billion each year.

Additional details on methodology and technical issues pertaining to specific variables are provided in the notes on each table. For further information about compiling the National Patterns statistics, contact NCSES.

R&D performers and funders. The U.S. R&D system consists of the R&D activities of differing performers and sources of funding for these activities. The main categories of R&D performers tracked by NCSES are businesses; federal agencies; FFRDCs (administered by businesses, universities, or nonprofit organizations); nonfederal government agencies (specifically those of the 50 states and the District of Columbia); higher education; and nonprofit organizations. For R&D funding, the main categories are businesses; the federal government; nonfederal government (state, regional, local); higher education; and nonprofit organizations. Organizations that perform R&D often receive significant levels of outside funding; R&D funders may also be significant performers.

Type of R&D. As defined by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development's Frascati Manual (in seven editions since the early 1960s), R&D spans three main types of activities:

Basic research: Experimental or theoretical work undertaken primarily to acquire new knowledge of the underlying foundations of phenomena and observable facts, without any particular application or use in view.

Applied research: Original investigation undertaken in order to acquire new knowledge. It is, however, directed primarily towards a specific, practical aim or objective.

Experimental development: Systematic work, drawing on knowledge gained from research and practical experience and producing additional knowledge, which is directed to producing new products or processes or improving existing products or processes.^​