Charity Commission search: check a charity's accounts

Short answer: To check a charity in England and Wales, search the Charity Commission register by its charity number and read the status, trustees, income and filing record. Quote figures from the accounts the charity filed, because register summaries can disagree.

A Charity Commission search is a lookup in the Register of Charities kept by the Charity Commission for England and Wales, used to confirm that an organisation is a registered charity and to read its status, purposes, trustees, income, spending and filing history.

Scotland and Northern Ireland keep their own registers, run by the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR) and the Charity Commission for Northern Ireland (CCNI). A cross-border charity can appear on more than one.

Each year a charity files an annual return, a short statement of its finances, and larger charities also file accounts. Trustees are the people legally responsible for the charity. The US equivalents are IRS exemption records and the yearly Form 990 return.

Seven steps from a charity name to a dated record and its accounts.

Six free tools and one we could not test, opened on 31 October 2026.

Charity Commission Register of Charities: The Charity Commission register is the free search of charities in England and Wales, showing trustees, five years of finances and each return's date received, plus a daily data extract. No login. Working.

Scottish Charity Register (OSCR): The Scottish Charity Register is OSCR's free search, showing status, legal form and annual submissions; since 9 March 2026 it also publishes trustee names and newly received accounts. No login. Working.

Charity Commission for Northern Ireland register: The CCNI register is the free search of Northern Ireland charities, with reporting status. No login. Working.

GOV.UK search, Charity Commission filter: GOV.UK search filtered to the Charity Commission finds inquiry reports and official warnings, which sit outside the register entry. No login. Working.

IRS Tax Exempt Organization Search: IRS Tax Exempt Organization Search is the free US lookup by EIN or name across Pub 78, the Auto-Revocation List, determination letters, Form 990-N and copies of returns. No login. Working.

ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer: ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer is a free search of US nonprofits with figures from Form 990 returns, the filed PDFs and a free API. No login. Working.

Candid (GuideStar): Candid's GuideStar profiles cover US nonprofits. Not tested: Forms 990 and board lists need a free account.

What we tested: On 31 October 2026 we ran each tool with public organisations and one generated name. Every tool we ran returned records, but two returned figures that differed from another source. Failures: the Charity Commission answered the generated name with 82,844 matches; OSCR put Oxfam's 2025 income £30,000 below the Charity Commission; ProPublica's API figures lagged its web page by two years; Candid needs an account.

Eight checks, one session, public inputs: a snapshot of access and behaviour on the test date, not a benchmark.

The Filed Accounts Rule: Quote a charity's figures from the accounts or return it filed, with the year and the register you read. Treat every summary, rating or copy as a pointer to that document.