Find a Tender vs Contracts Finder: What Changed?

Find a Tender vs Contracts Finder is no longer a simple choice between large and small contracts. For procurements under the Procurement Act 2023, Find a Tender is the central digital platform, including for notifiable below-threshold notices. Contracts Finder remains online, with continuing publication requirements for procurements started under the previous rules. See GOV.UK's Contracts Finder update.

Find a Tender: the central platform under the new rules

GOV.UK's central digital platform factsheet says the enhanced Find a Tender service launched on 24 February 2025. It is free to use and brings procurement notices and reusable supplier information together. You can read notices without paying for a commercial alert service.

Lower-value work can appear there too. The below-threshold guidance explains that advertising a regulated notifiable contract generally requires a below-threshold tender notice on the central platform. Notifiable thresholds are £12,000 for central government authorities and £30,000 for others, including VAT. There are exclusions and differences for devolved authorities; the guidance sets these out. A threshold does not mean every purchase must be openly advertised.

Contracts Finder: still available, especially for older procurements

The GOV.UK Contracts Finder service page still provides opportunity searches, previous contracts, saved searches and email updates. It says you can search without an account, while an account is needed for saving searches and receiving updates.

Which rules apply depends on when the procurement began. GOV.UK's transitional guidance explains that procurements begun under the previous legislation continue under it. Do not treat a newly published notice as proof that the procurement itself started under the new Act.

GOV.UK's Contracts Finder transparency guidance confirms that the Act does not require below-threshold information published on Find a Tender to be duplicated on Contracts Finder. Searching only Contracts Finder can therefore miss notices published under the new rules.

Scotland follows a separate regime for devolved buyers

The Act generally excludes devolved Scottish authorities, which continue under Scottish procurement legislation. Joint procurements and use of arrangements established by other authorities can be different: see the devolved authorities guidance. The Contracts Finder service page points Scottish searches to Public Contracts Scotland. Do not apply an England-focused portal comparison to every Scottish buyer.

How to search without relying on the old value split

1. Start on Find a Tender. Its official platform guide explains notice-type, suitability and contract-location filters, plus saved-search email notifications. Use notice type to separate opportunities from awards.
2. Check Contracts Finder for relevant previous contracts. The service guide describes its search and update options. Keep the older-procurement rules in mind rather than assuming the two services contain identical records.
3. Use the right regional source. GOV.UK's service guide also links to Public Contracts Scotland, Sell2Wales and Northern Ireland's procurement service. Follow the source appropriate to the buyer.

For the wider notice and registration changes, read our Procurement Act 2023 guide for small businesses. To see what TenderHawk's supported sources currently contain, use our UK tender statistics; the snapshot names its date and coverage limits rather than claiming to count every UK contract.

Official guidance checked on 16 October 2026. Check the linked guidance and the buyer's documents for the particular procurement.