Brain Imaging Data Structure
Published February 10, 2026 | Version 1.11.0
Software Open

The Brain Imaging Data Structure (BIDS) Specification

Authors/Creators

  • 1. NIMH, Intramural Research Program, Bethesda, MD, 20891, USA
  • 2. New York University, Department of Neurology, New York City, New York, 10016, USA
  • 3. Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine (INM-7), Research Center Juelich, Juelich, 52428, Germany
  • 4. IRCCS Istituto Centro San Giovanni di Dio Fatebenefratelli
  • 5. The University of Texas at Austin
  • 6. GlaxoSmithKline Research and Development
  • 7. Boston Children's Hospital, Department of Neurology, Boston, MA, 02115, USA
  • 8. Inria, Université Paris-Saclay
  • 9. LORIS, MCIN, Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University
  • 10. McGill University
  • 11. Department of Psychology, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, United States
  • 12. University of Milan
  • 13. université de Liège, Belgium
  • 14. University of Washington, Psychology, Seattle, WA, 98107, United States of America
  • 15. origami lab, McGill university, Montreal, Québec, Canada
  • 16. Swartz Center for Computational Neuroscience
  • 17. International Institute of Information Technology Bangalore
  • 18. CSIRO
  • 19. University of Oslo
  • 20. University of Pennsylvania
  • 21. Altos Labs
  • 22. CatalystNeuro
  • 23. University of Vienna
  • 24. Univ Rennes, Inria, CNRS, Inserm
  • 25. UC San Diego, Cognitive Science and Data Science, La Jolla, CA, 92093, USA
  • 26. Stanford University
  • 27. Mayo Clinic
  • 28. Inria, Univ Rennes, CNRS, Inserm, Rennes, 35042, France
  • 29. University of Trento
  • 30. Google LLC
  • 31. University of South Carolina, Department of Psychology, Columbia, SC, 29016, USA
  • 32. Dartmouth College, PBS, Hanover NH/USA
  • 33. McGill Centre for Integrative Neuroscience, Montreal Neurological Institute
  • 34. University of Liège, GIGA CRC in vivo imaging, Liège, 4000, Belgium
  • 35. Mayo Clinic Rochester
  • 36. Johns Hopkins University, Psychological and Brain Sciences, Baltimore, MD, 21218, United States
  • 37. University of Montreal
  • 38. Kiel University
  • 39. Dartmouth College, Center for Open Neuroscience
  • 40. Neurobiology Research Unit, Copenhagen University Hospital Rigshospitalet, DK-2100 Copenhagen, Denmark
  • 41. Georgia State University
  • 42. Research Software Engineering Team, University of Sheffield
  • 43. Indiana University, Psychological & Brain Sciences, Bloomington, IN, 47405, USA
  • 44. University of Liverpool
  • 45. National Institute of Mental Health
  • 46. University of Washington
  • 47. Boston University, Biomedical Engineering, Boston, MA 02215 USA
  • 48. Persyst Development Corporation, R&D, Toronto, ON M4K 1W8 Canada
  • 49. Change Your Brain, Change Your Life Foundation
  • 50. University of Oxford
  • 51. The University of Pennsylvania
  • 52. University of Arizona, RII, Tucson Arizona 85721 USA
  • 53. Utrecht University
  • 54. MIT, Cambridge, USA
  • 55. Heinrich-Heine-University, Department of Experimental Psychology, Dusseldorf, 40224, Germany
  • 56. IRCCS Istituto Centro San Giovanni di Dio Fatebenefratelli di Brescia
  • 57. Stanford University, Department of Psychology, Stanford, CA, 94063, USA
  • 58. Saarland University
  • 59. NIMH Data Science & Sharing Team, Bethesda, MD, 20892, USA
  • 60. UK Dementia Research Institute, Imperial College London, UK
  • 61. Forschungszentrum Jülich
  • 62. University of Birmingham
  • 63. Lund University
  • 64. University of Florence, European Laboratory for NonLinear Spectroscopy, Sesto Fiorentino, (FI), 50019, Italy
  • 65. Johannes-Gutenberg University Medical Center, Mainz Germany
  • 66. Invicro, Burlington Danes Building, Imperial College London, Hammersmith Hospital, Du Cane Road, London, W12 0NN, UK
  • 67. National Institutes of Health, Scientific and Statistical Computing Core, NIMH, Bethesda, MD 20892, USA
  • 68. Berenson-Allen Center for Noninvasive Brain Stimulation, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA, Department of Neurology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
  • 69. IRCCS Centro San Giovanni di Dio Fatebenefratelli
  • 70. National Institute of Optics, National Research Council
  • 71. Novonesis
  • 72. Essen University Hospital
  • 73. Columbia University
  • 74. Child Mind Institute
  • 75. University College London
  • 76. Spanish National Research Council (CSIC)
  • 77. Karolinska Institutet, Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Stockholm, 17177, Sweden
  • 78. Oticon A/S, Eriksholm Research Centre, Snekkersten, Denmark
  • 79. Copenhagen University Hospital, Neurobiology Research Unit, Section 8057, Blegdamsvej 9, 2100 Copenhagen, Denmark
  • 80. Johns Hopkins Medicine
  • 81. CRIUGM, Montreal, Quebec, H3W 1W5, Canada
  • 82. Radboud University
  • 83. Amsterdam University Medical Centers, Radiology and Nuclear Department, Amsterdam, 1013 EG, The Netherlands
  • 84. King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST)
  • 85. Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics
  • 86. Center for Open Neuroscience at Dartmouth College
  • 87. Radboud University Nijmegen, Donders Institute, Nijmegen, 6500 HB, The Netherlands
  • 88. Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, Dresden, 01309, Germany
  • 89. Italian Institute of Technology, Rovereto, Trentino, Italy
  • 90. Université de Sherbrooke
  • 91. Yale School of Medicine, Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, New Haven, CT, 06511, USA
  • 92. INSERM
  • 93. Stanford, Department of Psychology, Stanford, CA
  • 94. McGill Centre for Integrative Neuroscience, Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University
  • 95. Seattle Childrens Hospital
  • 96. University of California San Diego
  • 97. University of Groningen, University Medical Center Groningen, Department of Neurology, Movement Disorders Groningen, Hanzeplein 1, 9713 GZ, Groningen
  • 98. The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center
  • 99. Oldenburg University, Dept. of Psychology, 26129, Germany
  • 100. SDU
  • 101. Université de Sherbrooke, Department of Computer Science, Sherbrooke, (Québec), J1K 2R1, Canada
  • 102. Western University
  • 103. New York University
  • 104. Amsterdam University Medical Centers, Radiology and Nuclear Medicine, Amsterdam, 1081 HV, The Netherlands
  • 105. Fundació per al Foment de la Investigació Sanitària i Biomèdica
  • 106. Loyola University Chicago
  • 107. University of Oxford, Nuffield Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Oxford, UK
  • 108. Institute de Neuroscience de la Timone, CNRS, Marseille, 13005, France
  • 109. Polytechnique Montreal, Department of Electrical Engineering, Montreal, QC, Canada
  • 110. Kansas State University
  • 111. Yale School of Medicine
  • 112. Institut Pasteur
  • 113. University of Texas at San Antonio Department of Computer Science San Antonio, TX 78249 USA
  • 114. UT Austin
  • 115. University of Cambridge
  • 116. Technical University Berlin
  • 117. LBNL, Scientific Data Division
  • 118. Cardiff University, Cardiff University Brain Research Imaging Centre (CUBRIC), UK
  • 119. MIT
  • 120. Max Planck Institute for Human Development
  • 121. University of Houston, Dept. of Engineering Technology, Houston TX 77204, USA
  • 122. Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences
  • 123. Monash University
  • 124. Dynamics of Cognitive Processes Group Institut de Neurosciences des Systèmes, INS - UMR 1106 Inserm Aix-Marseille Université, France
  • 125. Amsterdam UMC, locatie VUmc
  • 126. Montreal Neurological Institute-Hospital, McConnell Brain Imaging Center, Montreal, Quebec, H2A
  • 127. University of Padova, Department of Information Engineering, Padova, Italy
  • 128. FISABIO, Join Unit Biomedical Imagin, Valencia, Valencia, 46006, Spain
  • 129. Université de Montréal, Canada
  • 130. Weill Cornell Medicine
  • 131. Universität Leipzig
  • 132. IRCCS Centro S Giovanni di Dio Fatebenefratelli
  • 133. Stanford University, Department of Psychology, CA, 94304, USA
  • 134. CNRS, Institut des Neurosciences de la Timone, Marseille, 13008, France
  • 135. McGill University, Canada
  • 136. Psychology Department, Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA, 94305, USA
  • 137. Polytechnique Montréal
  • 138. Concordia university, Montreal, Québec, Canada
  • 139. NeuroPoly Lab, Polytechnique Montréal
  • 140. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd, Research and Early Development, Basel, 4070, Switzerland
  • 141. King's College London
  • 142. Purdue University
  • 143. Mayo Clinic, Department of neurosurgery, Rochester, MN, USA
  • 144. University of Copenhagen, Department of Computer Science, Copenhagen, 2100, Denmark
  • 145. Newcastle University
  • 146. Charité—Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Department of Neurology, Berlin, 10115, Germany
  • 147. UAR3408-US50 CYCERON, Caen, 14000, France
  • 148. Paris Lodron Universität Salzburg
  • 149. National Institute on Aging Intramural Research Program
  • 150. High Field Dpt, Center for Image Sciences, University Medical Center Utrecht, 3584 CX Utrecht, NL
  • 151. The University of Birmingham
  • 152. University of Liege (Liege, Belgium)
  • 153. NYU School of Medicine
  • 154. Department of Radiology, Lausanne University Hospital, Lausanne, CH-1011, Switzerland
  • 155. Indian Institute of Science
  • 156. Department of Medical Imaging / Department of Medical Sciences, Ghent University Hospital / Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium
  • 157. Martinos Center @ MGH
  • 158. McGill University Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences
  • 159. NeuroDataScience - ORIGAMI lab, McConnell Brain Imaging Centre, Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital, McGill University, Montreal, Québec, Canada
  • 160. Charité University Medicine Berlin, Berlin Institute of Health, Berlin, 10115, Germany
  • 161. CNRS, Paris-Saclay University
  • 162. Ghent University Hospital
  • 163. University of Pittsburgh
  • 164. Max Planck - University of Toronto Centre for Neural Science and Technology
  • 165. Dell Medical School, The University of Texas at Austin
  • 166. LMU, Munich
  • 167. Université catholique de Louvain
  • 168. Inria Saclay - Île-de-France Research Centre
  • 169. MRC CBU, University of Cambridge, UK
  • 170. NIMH Intramural Research Program, Bethesda, MD 20850 USA, MD 20892 USA
  • 171. The Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health, Epilepsy Neuroinformatics Laboratory, Heidelberg, Victoria, 3084, Australia
  • 172. The University of Manchester
  • 173. Radboud University, Donders Institute, Nijmegen, 6525 EN, The Netherlands
  • 174. Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305 USA
  • 175. Indian Council of Agricultural Research
  • 176. Université de Montréal, Montreal, Québec, CA
  • 177. Princeton University
  • 178. University of Milan, Department of Biomedical and Clinical Sciences, Milan, 20137, Italy
  • 179. MIT, McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA
  • 180. Institute for Neural Computation, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92-93-0955, USA
  • 181. Swartz Center for Computational Neuroscience, UC San Diego
  • 182. Vanderbilt University, USA
  • 183. University of Western Australia;Centre for Microscopy, Characterisation, and Analysis;Perth;WA;6009;Australia
  • 184. Indiana University
  • 185. Uni. Bonn, Germany
  • 186. Maastricht University
  • 187. Hofstra Northwell School of Medicine at Hofstra University
  • 188. Program in Speech and Hearing Bioscience and Technology, Harvard University
  • 189. University of California, San Francisco
  • 190. CNRS, Institut de Neurosciences de la Timone (INT), Marseille, France
  • 191. Lausanne University Hospital (CHUV), Department of Clinical Neurosciences (DNC), Lausanne, 1007, Switzerland
  • 192. University Hospital Essen, Center for Translational and Behavioral Neuroscience, Department of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology and Neuroradiology
  • 193. University of California, Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, Los Angeles, CA, USA
  • 194. University of Pennsylvania, Department of Psychiatry, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 19104, United States
  • 195. INSERM, France
  • 196. University of Oxford, Big Data Institute, Oxford, OX3 7LF, UK
  • 197. LMU Munich
  • 198. University of Surrey, School of Psychology, Guildford, GU2 7XH, United Kingdom
  • 199. Forschungszentrum Jülich, Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine (INM-1), Jülich, 52428, Germany
  • 200. University of Wisconsin-Madison
  • 201. University of Colorado Boulder
  • 202. National Police Foundation
  • 203. BrockU, LORIS, MCIN, Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University
  • 204. Aalto University, Finland
  • 205. Tri-institutional Center for Translational Research in Neuroimaging and Data Science (TReNDS), Georgia State, Georgia Tech, and Emory, Atlanta, GA 30030
  • 206. Business School, Universidad Torcuato di Tella
  • 207. UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology
  • 208. Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
  • 209. Christchurch Hospital
  • 210. The Ohio State University
  • 211. Dartmouth College
  • 212. National Institute of Mental Health
  • 213. Collège Sainte-Anne de Lachine

Description

The Brain Imaging Data Structure (BIDS) is a simple and intuitive way to organize and describe data.

Notes

To cite the BIDS specification, please follow the instructions here: https://bids-specification.rtfd.io/en/latest/introduction.html#citing-bids HTML versions of the BIDS specification can be browsed following this link: https://bids-specification.rtfd.io PDF versions of the BIDS specification can be found in the Zenodo archives listed under "identifiers" below in the present `CITATION.cff` file.

Files

bids-standard/bids-specification-pdf-releases-1.11.0.zip

Files (3.0 MB)

Additional details

Related works

Is supplement to
Software: https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification-pdf-releases/tree/1.11.0 (URL)

Software

Repository URL
https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification-pdf-releases