Statistical Parametric Mapping (SPM)¶

Overview¶

Statistical Parametric Mapping is an integrated set of methods for testing hypotheses about neuroimaging data. These methods are implemented in an open-source software package SPM.

The current release supports the analysis of fMRI, PET, SPECT, EEG and MEG.

spm logo

Getting started¶

SPM is openly available and designed to work across all major operating systems. We recommend you use the lastest version.

Older versions are available but no longer supported: SPM12 SPM8 SPM5 SPM99.

Installation¶

Windows macOS Linux

Download the latest SPM release and uncompress it.

Start MATLAB and add SPM to your path:

addpath('C:\Users\<login>\Documents\MATLAB\spm')
savepath % if you want to save the current MATLAB path

For a detailed overview of the steps, please check our installation page.

Download the latest SPM release and uncompress it.

Start MATLAB and add SPM to your path:

addpath /Users/<login>/spm
savepath % if you want to save the current MATLAB path

For a detailed overview of the steps, please check our installation page.

Download the latest SPM release and uncompress it.

Start MATLAB and add SPM to your path:

addpath /home/<login>/spm
savepath % if you want to save the current MATLAB path

For a detailed overview of the steps, please check our installation page.

Alternative installation options

For other installation options, including versions not requiring MATLAB, please consult our installation instructions

Usage¶

Once installed, you can use SPM via the graphical user interface or command line. Please see our tutorials page for examples.

Citing SPM¶

Please acknowledge using SPM by citing:

Tierney et al., (2025). SPM 25: open source neuroimaging analysis software. Journal of Open Source Software, 10(110), 8103, https://doi.org/10.21105/joss.08103.

@article{Tierney2025, 
    title = {SPM 25: open source neuroimaging analysis software}, 
    author = {Tierney, Tim M. and Alexander, Nicholas A. and Ashburner, John and Avila, Nicole Labra and Balbastre, Yaël and Barnes, Gareth and Bezsudnova, Yulia and Brudfors, Mikael and Eckstein, Korbinian and Flandin, Guillaume and Friston, Karl and Jafarian, Amirhossein and Kowalczyk, Olivia S. and Litvak, Vladimir and Medrano, Johan and Mellor, Stephanie and O'Neill, George and Parr, Thomas and Razi, Adeel and Timms, Ryan and Zeidman, Peter}, 
    journal = {Journal of Open Source Software} 
    doi = {10.21105/joss.08103}, 
    url = {https://doi.org/10.21105/joss.08103}, 
    year = {2025}, 
    publisher = {The Open Journal}, 
    volume = {10}, 
    number = {110}, 
    pages = {8103}, 
}

Other SPM-relevant references can be found on the reference page.

License¶

SPM is an open-source software available under GPL-2.0 license. For more details, see the license.

Contributing¶

The development of SPM takes place on GitHub. If you wish to contribute, please visit our development page.