Release notes
Summary of release highlights for the Open Targets Platform
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Summary of release highlights for the Open Targets Platform
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19 March 2025
New features
Variant, study, and credible set information is now available in the Open Targets Platform. This unites the Open Targets Platform and Open Targets Genetics into a single interface for human genetic and target discovery information.
Interpret gene-disease evidence from both common and rare variation in one resource, and in multiple ancestries.
The Platform now has three additional entities:
: functional context for 6.5M rare and common variants
Please note: the Platform only integrates variants associated with a disease, trait, or phenotype
: GWAS and molQTL studies
: 2.6 million credible sets derived from various sources
Colocalisation is now based on credible set overlaps
A new machine learning model which prioritises likely causal genes at each GWAS locus by using functional genomics features. The Platform also uses as part of the L2G predictions to illustrate the relative contribution of each feature.
Data updates
A substantial increase in the literature evidences due to improvements in resolving disambiguation of entities.
Updated gene burden data through FinnGen R12.
New NHS Genomic Medicine Service panels from GEL PanelApp and a new hearing loss panel to the Gene2Phenotype evidence set.
Rewritten Uniprot pipeline with new associations from Uniprot variants
Updated data from Probes&Drugs and DepMap.
New data from Reactome, ChEMBL, Europe PMC, COSMIC and EVA (through ClinVar).
Product features
An updated data downloads page which has a more detailed description of each file. (Temporary removal of schema which will be brought back in the subsequent release).
Various improvements to our web interface:
Users can search the UI using variants and study id.
Improved searching, filtering and sorting of entities on our associations pages. In particular, there are now separate sections for uploaded entity lists and pinned entities, and you can remove individual filters from the view.
The platform and the Target Prioritisation view has a more accessible colour scheme. Option to select desired columns in the UI.
A graphical Comparative Genomics view in Target Prioritisation.
Preview on hover: Ability to view details of an entity without navigating to it.
Product enhancements and bug fixes
Filtered out Phase IV clinical trial evidence that lacks regulatory approval for the specific indication from our target-disease association data.
The BE infrastructure has been upgraded to Scala 3
Improved and restructured documentation.
78,766 targets
28,513 diseases and phenotypes
18,081 drugs and compounds
28,168,992 evidence strings
10,162,821 target-disease associations
6,493,882 variants
18 September 2024
New features
Data updates
New safety liabilities associated with several targets which are routinely used by pharmaceutical companies have been added, from Brennan et al. (2024).
New Gene Burden evidence from the LoF burden analyses in FinnGen’s latest public release (R11).
New data from Reactome, Europe PMC, COSMIC and EVA (through ClinVar).
Product features
Improved visualisation for Gene essentiality data from Cancer DepMap.
Updated frontend table design and functionality leading to better searching/filtering and sorting functionality for most tables in the UI.
The classic associations view has been deprecated from the Platform..
Product enhancements and bug fixes
OpenAI model in the literature summarisation tool was updated to GPT-4o-mini.
Changes to variant field in the cancer biomarker evidence.
Aggregated the granularity of the description of phenotypes inside cohortPhenotypes to resolve duplication in ChEMBL evidence.
Bug fixes: pharmacogenetics schema, molecule dataset.
63,121 targets
28,327 diseases and phenotypes
18,041 drugs and compounds
17,853,184 evidence strings
8,155,988 target-disease associations
19 June 2024
New features
Uploading a custom list of targets or diseases to obtain a tailored associations view allowing users to view selected target-disease evidence for the specific entities.
Data updates
Integration of ChEMBL 34 which now contains data from the European Medicines Agency (EMA) increasing drug-indication coverage.
Updates to the clinical trials and tractability data.
New gene burden evidence for schizophrenia from the SCHEMA consortium and ancestry-specific evidence for prostate cancer.
A new Gene2Phenotype panel with musculo-skeletal implications.
New data from Reactome, COSMIC and EVA (through ClinVar), Probes and Drugs and GEL PanelApp increasing our coverage of data.
Product features
Ability to handle pharmacogenetic evidence involving drug combinations.
Product enhancements and bug fixes
Exclusion of splice QTLs from the assessment for the direction of effect and selecting the beta from the evidence with the lowest p-value instead of the largest effect size.
Improvements in the AotF GQL Playground Component.
Dropping isHumanApplicable field from target safety.
Bug fixes to the ClinVar (somatic) widget loading state.
Resolving an error in phenotype mapping in GEL PanelApp, resolving incorrect tractability precedence and removing categorical burden tests from Genebass data based on community feedback.
63,226 targets
28,198 diseases and phenotypes
18,041 drugs and compounds
17,703,456 evidence strings
8,079,215 target-disease associations
20 March 2024
New features
Implementation of direction of effect assessment for eight different sources of target-disease association evidence.
Filtering bibliography data based on a publication date.
Data updates
Integration of the latest dataset from Project Score.
New data from Reactome, COSMIC and EVA (through ClinVar) increasing our coverage of data.
Product features
Inclusion of star alleles from PharmGKB and a new Direct Drug Target column to the pharmacogenetics widget.
Use of pharmacogenetics data to inform adverse drug response as an additional source of information on target safety.
New dedicated GraphQL API query playground for Associations-on-the-Fly and target prioritisation view.
Product enhancements and bug fixes
Redesigned context menu with a new navigation and pinning behaviour.
Updated protvista-uniprot viewer library to v2.11.1.
Bug fixes to download file schema and search issues.
63,226 targets
25,817 diseases and phenotypes
17,111 drugs and compounds
17,317,290 evidence strings
7,802,260 target-disease associations
30 November 2023
New features
A new widget in the Platform adding pharmacogenetics data from PharmGKB.
Data updates
New data available on Baseline RNA and protein expression data for targets via the API and FTP.
New data from Reactome and EVA (through ClinVar) increasing our coverage of data.
Product features
Users can easily export the entire associations table and the target prioritisation table in json or tsv format.
Updated search bar design with search suggestions.
Product enhancements and bug fixes
Transition to OpenSearch from Elasticsearch.
Bug fixes in the widgets in the Association On The Fly view and styling issues.
62,733 targets
25,246 diseases and phenotypes
17,095 drugs and compounds
16,710,896 evidence strings
7,994,180 target-disease associations
21 September 2023
New features
OpenAI Literature Summarisation tool - For data features that link to publications, users can ask for a natural language summary of the target-disease evidence presented in the publication using LangChain and OpenAI’s GPT3.5 Turbo model.
Data updates
Increase in Europe PMC literature evidence by 9.9% to 10,355,423
New data from ChEMBL, COSMIC and EVA (through ClinVar) increasing our coverage of data
Product features
Easy access to the schema of the files available for download in the Open Targets Platform
Product enhancements and bug fixes
Open Targets Platform user interface migration to Material UI v5
Refactoring of the sections in the frontend codebase - Components and sections moved into the packages/sections and packages/ui
62,733 targets
25,209 diseases and phenotypes
17,096 drugs and compounds
16,232,046 evidence strings
7,922,844 target-disease associations
26 June 2023
New features
Data updates
Updated data from ChEMBL, including adverse event drug warning data and more granular information on clinical phases
New data from IntoGEN, Europe PMC, and EVA (through ClinVar) increasing our coverage of data
Product features
Product enhancements and bug fixes
Fixes - homology widget, fixes to the data
More meaningful 404 error message
Fixed bugs in the API Playground
62,685 targets
24,713 diseases and phenotypes
13,210 drugs and compounds
15,117,741 evidence strings
7,835,247 target-disease associations
22 February 2023
In addition to regular updates from our data providers, we have a number of new features in this release:
New evidence for target-disease associations
Additional data for metabolic biomarkers added to our Gene Burden widget
QTL-based direction of effect included in evidence from Open Targets Genetics
Improved target annotation data
Integration of Target safety evidence from AOPWiki
New data from Probes and Drugs’ 04.2022 release
Literature updates
Preprints and patents now included in our bibliography
Development updates
Redesigned search
Provenance metadata
62,678 targets
24,713 diseases and phenotypes
12,854 drugs and compounds
10,446,771 evidence strings
6,656,559 target-disease associations
24 November 2022
In addition to continuous updates from our data providers, we have introduced the following new features:
Gene burden data for Parkinson’s disease
Updated classifications for clinical trial stop reasons
Variant functional consequences, available to browse in the Gene2Phenotype and Orphanet widgets
Other improvements and bug fixes
62,678 targets
22,274 diseases and phenotypes
12,854 drugs and compounds
14,611,717 evidence strings
6,960,486 target-disease associations
29 September 2022
New data, in particular:
Open Targets Genetics
Genomics England PanelApp
Gene burden
Probes and drugs
New data integrity file, in line with FAIR principles
61,888 targets
20,931 diseases and phenotypes
12,854 drugs and compounds
14,229,684 evidence strings
7,003,171 target-disease associations
24 June 2022
New data: five additional gene burden analyses from Genebass
New feature: new visualisation of subcellular locations of targets now available to users
New ontology term: “medical procedure”
61,524 targets
23,074 diseases and phenotypes
12,854 drugs and compounds
14,455,104 evidence strings
7,247,865 target-disease associations
28 April 2022
New datasource: gene burden analyses from Regeneron and the AstraZeneca
Integration of structural variants from ClinVar
Additional information from DailyMed drug label text-mining
NLP classification of why clinical trials stopped
New data: Gene2phenotype cardiac panel
61,524 targets
18,520 diseases and phenotypes
12,854 drugs and compounds
13,829,174 evidence strings
7,541,360 target-disease associations
28 February 2022
Gene2Phenotype terminology updated in line with the Gene Curation Coalition (GenCC)
Data updates from a range of providers including Open Targets Genetics and ChEMBL
61,524 targets
18,468 diseases and phenotypes
12,594 drugs and compounds
10,880,832 evidence strings
7,980,448 target-disease associations
29 November 2021
New Cancer Biomarkers evidence data from the Cancer Genome Interpreter
Updated genetic association evidence from Open Targets Genetics
Embedded GraphQL API playground for each data table and query
60,636 targets
18,706 diseases and phenotypes
12,594 drugs and compounds
10,481,189 evidence strings
7,787,231 target-disease associations
30 September 2021
Integration of Genetic Constraint data from gnomAD and new Chemical Probes data from Probes & Drugs database
Data updates from EFO, ChEMBL, and Mouse Genome Informatics
Other improvements and bug fixes
60,636 targets
18,663 diseases and phenotypes
12,594 drugs and compounds
11,071,233 evidence strings
7,927,820 target-disease associations
30 June 2021
Updated Open Targets Genetics Portal evidence, which included the integration of FinnGen biobank data (R5) and new GWAS Catalog studies
Integration of gene-disease data from Orphanet
Improvements to the user interface (e.g. datatype chips on evidence page)
Bug fixes (e.g. users can download Known Drugs table, association scores in datasets match values returned by API)
60,606 targets
18,507 diseases and phenotypes
13,185 drugs and compounds
13,267,236 evidence strings
9,216,710 target-disease associations
A new Scalable and reproducible genetic analyses pipeline available as a Python package for post-GWAS analysis: .
- Open Targets' Task ExecutoR i.e. scripts that process and prepare data for our ETL pipelines.
Post 25.03, the data downloads paths have changed as now only parquet file format is available. Also there are minor changes to the name of the dataset (snake_case & singular). More details can be found .
Check out the for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
Users now have the ability to apply target-specific or disease/phenotype-specific filters to the target-disease association and target prioritisation pages. Read more details about the feature in our .
Check out the for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
Updating the gene burden results from AstraZeneca’s PheWAS portal .
Check out the for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
Integration of the 23Q4 version of DepMap ().
Check out the for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
'Target Prioritisation' view: A new view for assessment of the target features considered when prioritising (or deprioritising) targets for drug discovery. Watch a detailed video .
Check out the for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
‘Associations on the Fly’ - revamp of the current Open Targets Platform association page with new facets and additional built-in functionalities like view data directly in the associations table, control weights of contributing evidence, filter by datasource and data type (OR filters) and pin rows. Watch a detailed video .
Updated Molecular Interactions data source to version 12.0
Expanded the definition of a drug to include all probes as reported by as chemical probes are useful from a target's doability perspective
Check out the for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
Addition of a CRISPR Screens widget featuring data from
Introduction of a Cancer DepMap widget showcasing gene essentiality data from the
Missense variants in the OT Genetics, UniProt variants and ClinVar widgets now link to , a new tool to interpret the functional consequences of human missense variants
Check out the for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
Check out the for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
Check out the for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
Check out the for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
Check out the for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
Check out the for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
Check out the for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
Check out the for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
Integration of new PROTAC tractability data from
Check out our for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
Check out our for more information on the new features and datasets introduced in this release.
Visit the for more data metrics for this release, including a per datasource breakdown of evidence strings.
For release notes for previous releases, check out the .