SPSS Statistics is a software package used for interactive, or batched, statistical analysis. Long produced by SPSS Inc., it was acquired by IBM in 2009. Current versions (post 2015) have the brand name: IBM SPSS Statistics.

The software name originally stood for Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS), reflecting the original market, then later changed to Statistical Product and Service Solutions.

SPSS is a widely used program for statistical analysis in social science. It is also used by market researchers, health researchers, survey companies, government, education researchers, marketing organizations, data miners, and others. The original SPSS manual (Nie, Bent & Hull, 1970) has been described as one of “sociology’s most influential books” for allowing ordinary researchers to do their own statistical analysis.

In addition to statistical analysis, data management (case selection, file reshaping, creating derived data) and data documentation (a metadata dictionary is stored in the datafile) are features of the base software.

Statistics included in the base software:

• Descriptive statistics: Cross tabulation, Frequencies, Descriptives, Explore, Descriptive Ratio Statistics
• Bivariate statistics: Means, t-test, ANOVA, Correlation (bivariate, partial, distances), Nonparametric tests, Bayesian
• Prediction for numerical outcomes: Linear regression
• Prediction for identifying groups: Factor analysis, cluster analysis (two-step, K-means, hierarchical), Discriminant
• Geo spatial analysis, simulation
• R extension (GUI), Python