At Best Dosage, we commonly lean on Leafly for information on strains, dispensaries, and products. We’d like to let you know a little bit more about why we rely on Leafly.

Leafly quick facts

Leafly is one of the internet’s oldest strain databases

Leafly has been in constant operation since its launch in 2010. The original founders of Leafly left in 2011 to start Headset, one of the most renowned market research platforms in the cannabis industry.

By 2012, Leafly had achieved 2.3 million monthly visitors, and in 2014, Leafly became the first cannabis-related company to place an ad in The New York Times. By the numbers alone, it’s clear that Leafly was rapidly becoming the internet’s most-relied-upon source of cannabis information.

Recent events have cemented Leafly’s mainstream success. After a highly successful launch in Canada in 2018, Leafly took on former Amazon exec Tim Leslie as its CEO.

Leafly is far from some random site out in the weeds. It’s essentially Silicon Valley’s prodigal cannabis resource, filled to the brim with funding and ideals.

It’s primarily funded by advertising income

If a cannabis site’s primary revenue source is product sales, it’s guaranteed to be biased. The top priority of a site driven by ad sales, however, is traffic.

The most reliable way to generate traffic is to produce high-quality, useful content that internet users love. There’s a reason cannabis-boosted brains are now hardwired to click a Leafy link first in Google search results.

Since it doesn’t primarily make its money through product sales, Leafly is beholden to the quality of its content. That’s the kind of leverage you want to see when you’re looking for a reliable purveyor of cannabis information.

Leafly has a strong project mission

A quick look at Leafly’s “About” page is enough to confirm our suspicions about the site. With phrases like, “we lead with truth,” and, “we’re driven by tech,” Leafly clearly declares its top-tier status within the technocratic cannabis information oligarchy.

Leafly envisions a “world where everyone can experience the benefits of cannabis.” Boasting of its more than 100 million unique annual visitors, Leafly credits its “proven commitment to education and science-based information.”

Declaring itself to be “on the cutting edge of cannabis journalism,” Leafly is dedicated to “debunking myths that erode the positive impact of legal cannabis.” References of “huge, exciting problems” that can be solved in the “place where cannabis meets tech” tell you everything you need to know about Leafly’s position at the head of the cannabis infotainment boom.

Leafly helps the industry with business solutions

Leafly doesn’t just provide useful data to cannabis consumers, researchers, and other cannabis-curious internet users. This site also offers a whole suite of services to cannabis brands and retailers.

Start by listing your cannabis or CBD store in Leafly’s database. You can also directly advertise your brand or store as well as allow Leafly users to place orders at your licensed retailer or medical practice without having to leave the site.

It tells you a lot about Leafly’s authority within the cannabis information hierarchy that this site certifies cannabis testing labs. Certification from Leafly actually means a lot, and I recognize a few of the names in Leafly’s shortlist of affiliated labs.

High-quality, well-researched content

Cannabis content can be iffy. Amidst well-intentioned writers who lack finesse and clearly opportunistic brands, oases of genuine, high-quality cannabis information are few and far between.

With an epic abundance of credible sources and clear, easily understood prose, Leafly dominates the cannabis strain information and dispensary directory markets. More commonly than you’d expect, Leafly shows up first in Google results for obscure cannabis-related questions.

Within the cannabis content industry, writers regard Leafly with almost as much respect as the peer-reviewed studies this site so commonly references. The Leafly writing team is clearly talented and dedicated to relaying cannabis information as clearly and concisely as possible.

A variety of content categories

Leafly remains best-known for its strain reviews, dispensary information, and product data. With a little bit of digging, however, you’ll find out why Leafly is now a definitive source of cannabis information.

On Leafly, you’ll find original, scholarly articles on the benefits of CBD. You’ll find the latest cannabis and hemp industry news. You’ll find an enormous educational database on all things cannabis, and you’ll even learn more about the current impact of the cannabis industry on social inequality.

Over the years, Leafly has used the success of its core business model to establish authority in a variety of cannabis-related fields. While Leafly doesn’t have a monopoly on valuable cannabis data, it’s not a source you can reasonably exclude when hunting down information on cannabis.

Leafly helps the entire cannabis industry operate better

From reaching out a hand to brands and retailers keen to expand their reach to providing consumers with crisp, well-written reports, Leafly is a hub that ties together a significant portion of the North American cannabis industry.

Even if you commonly prefer scientific sources, there’s no avoiding linking Leafly in the life of a cannabis writer. As a matter of fact, Leafly is often the best place to find links to relevant studies on your topic.

It’s hard for dispensaries to thrive without being listed on Leafly, and once you have an account, it’s easy to boost your presence with Leafly’s integrated ad services. On Leafly, a simple quest to look up a strain can turn into an hours-long rabbit hole involving dozens of tabs.

In essence, a source as important as Leafly can’t help but be authoritative on the market it envelops. After all, Leafly’s close inner network constitutes a considerable portion of the industry on which this site reports.

Leafly overall score

As an overall resource for cannabis information, we award Leafly a perfect combined score of 5 out of 5.

Authority: 5
Clarity: 5
Sourcing: 5
Topics: 5
Community: 5

Leafly is one of the internet’s most-respected and most-trusted cannabis resources. Leafly content is remarkably clear, well-sourced, and it spans a surprisingly large range of topics.

Perhaps most importantly, Leafly is clearly committed to advancing the goals of the cannabis industry. A reliable informer and ally, Leafy is an indispensable component of any cannabis researcher’s toolkit.