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updatedAt: 2025-03-13T14:36:40.000Z
agentTools:
  projectIndex: https://docs.censys.com/llms.txt
---

# Censys Universal Internet Dataset Download Release and Timeline FAQ

Answers to commonly asked questions about downloading the Censys Universal Internet Dataset.

## What is the Censys Universal Internet Dataset?

The Censys Universal Internet Dataset is the most comprehensive Internet-wide data collected from scan in the industry.

This dataset consists of four downloadable data sets: IPv4 hosts, IPv6 hosts, IPv4 virtual (or name-based) hosts, and IPv6 virtual hosts.

## What is changing?

The four currently downloadable series that comprise the Censys Universal Internet Dataset are being replaced.

They contain the same information but are now encoded using [Google’s BigQuery Avro Export ](https://cloud.google.com/bigquery/docs/exporting-data#avro_export_details) format.

Each series retains the same schema as its deprecated counterpart, but one data encoding has been improved from previous datasets, and default values now adhere more closely to strict decoders.

### IPv4 Hosts (Unnamed)

Old Series Name: `universal-internet-dataset`

New Series Name: `universal-internet-dataset-v2-ipv4`

### IPv6 Hosts (Unnamed)

Old Series Name: `universal-internet-dataset-ipv6`

New Series Name: `universal-internet-dataset-v2-ipv6`

### IPv4 Virtual Hosts (Name-Based Scans)

Old Series Name: `universal-internet-dataset-named-ipv4`

New Series Name: `universal-internet-dataset-v2-ipv4-virtual-hosts`

### IPv6 Virtual Hosts (Name-Based Scans)

Old Series Name: `universal-internet-dataset-named-ipv6`

New Series Name: `universal-internet-dataset-v2-ipv6-virtual-hosts`

## How has the schema changed?

It hasn’t.

The encoding of timestamp fields changed from a string to a long, annotated as a `timestamp-micros` [logical type](https://avro.apache.org/docs/1.8.0/spec.html#Time+%28microsecond+precision%29).

Other encodings remain the same but are now entirely compliant in setting safe default values (for example, Previously, `0` was set as the default value for latitude, but strict decoders want a default of `0.0`).

## When did the change happen?

The v2 Censys Universal Internet Dataset series became available as of January 2023, and we discontinued publishing legacy datasets on May 31, 2023.

## Additional information

Learn how Censys models [interface-facing hosts](https://docs.censys.com/update/docs/ls-censys-universal-internet-dataset#/).

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