Mindat.org
| Owner | Hudson Institute of Mineralogy |
|---|---|
| Created by | Jolyon Ralph, et al. |
| Website |
www |
| Alexa rank |
 |
| Commercial | No |
| Launched | 10 October 2000 |
Mindat.org is a non-commercial online mineralogical database, claiming to be the largest mineral database and mineralogical reference website on the internet. It is used by professional mineralogists and amateur mineral collectors alike.
It contains a significant database of minerals, localities and mineral photographs, and is updated constantly by registered users adding and editing entries.
As of 2016, it included:
- 45,289 mineral names (this includes mineral varieties, synonyms and discredited names), of which 5,091 are minerals or mineraloids recognized by the International Mineralogical Association.
- 261,955 mineral localities worldwide, with information on 903,204 mineral occurrences within these sites.
- Over 647,000 photos of minerals have been uploaded, arranged into galleries from collectors and institutions worldwide who wish to share their mineral collections online.
- 48,657 users registered to upload photos and/or edit data.
History of Mindat.org
Mindat was started in 1993 as a personal database project by Jolyon Ralph. He then developed further versions as a Microsoft Windows application before launching a community-editable database web site in October 2000.[1]
Mindat.org is now part of the Hudson Institute of Mineralogy, a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit educational foundation incorporated in the state of New York.
Jolyon Ralph was awarded the Mineralogical Society of America's Distinguished public service medal in 2011 for his work on Mindat.org.[2]