The SDSS Legacy Archive is the collection of "science-ready" data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) available through MAST.  These pages document the kinds of SDSS data products available in MAST, where they can be found within the MAST tools and services, and how to search for and download SDSS products within the MAST ecosystem.

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The SDSS Legacy Archive


The Mikulski Archive for Space Telescopes (MAST) is now hosting data products from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) in a new project called the SDSS Legacy Archive.  SDSS is a prolific and ongoing international collaboration collecting photometric and spectroscopic data across both hemispheres since 1998.  Start at the Introduction to SDSS page for an introduction and summary to the SDSS project. By the end of 2027,  MAST will host all the final "science-ready" data products from the entirety of SDSS, from the original SDSS-I, up to SDSS-V.  These products include the legacy imaging and spectra, observational and catalog products from the core surveys, as well as all Value-Added Catalogs (VACS) released throughout SDSS history. The SDSS catalog products offer lists of targets, metadata, observing parameters, and analysis pipeline outputs for millions of targets observed across every SDSS survey.  All these datasets will be integrated seamlessly into MAST, touching almost all of MAST services, ranging from observations available the MAST User Portal, to a new SDSS search interface (coming soon), to catalogs available in the new catalogs-mast interface, to HSLP-integration and dataset support in Jdaviz.



Table of Contents

The following pages contain more information about the SDSS Legacy Archive, each of the surveys, and how to search and download SDSS Data at MAST. 


Accessing Data at MAST

The Data Access at MAST page describes how to search for and download SDSS data using MAST interfaces. SDSS data still remains available through the SDSS-provided services including the Science Archive Server (SAS) and Catalog Archive Server (CAS). Accessing SDSS data through MAST provides all of the advantages of a multi-mission archive: SDSS data is now accessible through the same interfaces as HST, JWST, TESS, and Gaia holdings, opening up new opportunities for scientific synergies between missions. Legacy SDSS spans a wide range of scientific sub-fields, from Baryonic Acoustic Oscillation (BAO) signals measured from high-redshift quasars and LRGs, to a complete chemical composition of MW stars in the infrared, to a wide-field IFU survey of ~10k low-redshift galaxies.  SDSS-V is a complete stellar and gas survey of the Milky Way and Local Volume, with detailed analysis of infrared stellar observations, and a fully tiled IFU survey of the Milky Way disk and Magellanic Clouds. These science areas will enhance the existing breadth of science opportunities available in MAST, with overlapping HST and JWST stellar observations, TESS and Gaia holdings, and Roman full-sky imaging and spectroscopic follow-up. 

User Support

For MAST user support, contact the HelpDesk: archive@stsci.edu. See the Archive Support page for details and other resources.

Citations and Acknowledgements

In publications, refer to this document as:

  • MAST 2024, SDSS Legacy Archive Manual, eds. B. Cherinka, J. Imig (Baltimore: STScI)

Please acknowledge the use of data obtained from MAST in publications.