Chatbots are everywhere, and you probably need a high-quality chatbot dataset. From helping you return a package to reminding you of your next dentist appointment—they’re the digital assistants of our time.
But behind that smooth talk and instant replies is one thing: data. A lot of it.
So if you’re building, training, or improving a chatbot in 2025, the dataset you choose can make or break the whole experience.
In this article, we’re diving into:
- What chatbot datasets are
- How to choose the right one for your needs
- A curated list of 20 top chatbot datasets
Let’s go.
What Is a Chatbot Dataset?
A chatbot dataset is a collection of conversations. Text messages. Dialogues. Question-answer pairs.
These datasets teach bots how to talk. How to reply smartly. And most importantly, how not to sound like a confused toaster.
Depending on the use case, these datasets can be:
- Open-domain (like casual chat with no fixed topic)
- Task-oriented (like booking a flight or fixing your router)
- Q&A-focused (think customer service bots or Google Assistant)
- Multilingual or domain-specific (healthcare, banking, etc.)
How to Pick the Right Dataset (Without Losing Your Mind)
Choosing a dataset isn’t about grabbing the biggest file you can find. You’ve got to think it through.
Here’s what to look for:
| Feature | Why It Matters |
|---|---|
| Domain Relevance | Is it about tech support, shopping, or dating? |
| Quality & Cleanliness | Spelling errors, incomplete turns = bad learning |
| Dialog Format | Single-turn or multi-turn? Scripted or natural? |
| Size & Balance | Enough variety without drowning in noise |
| License | Is it free to use commercially or academic-only? |
| Realism | Real human convos beat synthetic ones every time |
Top 20 Chatbot Datasets to Use in 2025
Grouped by task, simplified to the bone, and packed with real facts.
Open-Domain / Free-Form Chat
These datasets help your chatbot hold natural conversations, the kind you’d have at a coffee shop or over a Slack thread.
1. OpenSubtitles
Free
Movie and TV subtitles are goldmines for human-like banter. This dataset captures all the sass, sarcasm, and slang you’d want your bot to know. Just remember—it’s not task-specific, so don’t expect it to help you book a flight.
2. Cornell Movie Dialogues
Free
Ever wished your bot could talk like a movie character? This one’s got 220k+ lines from films, loaded with witty exchanges and diverse personalities. Great for multi-turn dialogue training—just know it leans fictional.
3. Persona-Chat (Facebook)
Free
This dataset brings personas into play. Each conversation has a backstory behind it, teaching bots to sound more consistent and, dare we say, human. It's perfect for personalized bots, but a bit roleplay-heavy.
4. LMSYS Chatbot Arena Conversations
Free
What happens when you pit top LLMs against each other? You get this dataset—33k+ rated conversations. It’s a fantastic resource for learning what users like (and hate) in chatbot replies.
Task-Oriented Dialogs
These are built for bots with jobs—booking things, answering FAQs, and helping users complete tasks fast and right.
5. MultiWOZ
6. Taskmaster-1 & 2
Free
This dataset mixes real and simulated dialogues across domains like movies, flights, and food. It's versatile and packed with natural phrasing—great for any assistant-style bot.
7. Frames
Free
If your chatbot recommends things—like vacations or phones—this dataset is your wingman. It’s built for recommendation tasks and includes detailed frame tracking across 19k dialog turns.
8. Schema-Guided Dialogue (SGD)
Free
This one’s a beast. Covering 16 domains and 18 services, it simulates the real-world messiness of dialog tasks like appointment scheduling or service inquiries. Excellent for intent-slot training.
Q&A & Knowledge Bots
Need your bot to sound smart? These datasets teach it how to answer real questions with context, clarity, and confidence.
9. SQuAD v2.0
Free
The classic. Over 150,000 questions based on Wikipedia articles. Includes unanswerable questions, so your bot learns when to say “I don’t know” (a rare skill, honestly).
10. Natural Questions (Google)
Free
Real user queries from Google Search, complete with long and short answers. Perfect for building bots that handle web-style Q&A in a natural way.
11. TriviaQA
Free
Need a quizmaster bot? This one’s for you. 650,000+ trivia questions with answers sourced from quiz leagues and Wikipedia—perfect for gamified experiences.
Multilingual Chatbots
Training bots to speak multiple languages? These datasets make sure they don’t sound like a Google Translate glitch.
12. Tatoeba
Free
Built by a global community, Tatoeba is packed with short sentence pairs in over 350 languages. While it’s not full-blown dialogue, it’s gold for training multilingual understanding, sentence generation, and translation. Lightweight, open, and endlessly flexible.
13. MultiATIS++
Free
Originally from flight booking scenarios, this dataset covers eight languages and supports intent classification and slot filling. A great starter for multilingual NLU.
14. MTOP (Multilingual Task-Oriented Parsing)
Free
If your chatbot needs to juggle tasks and languages at the same time, this is the one. MTOP has fine-grained annotations across six languages.
Customer Support & Real-World Use
These sets are raw, real, and full of human frustration—ideal for training bots that solve real problems and soothe angry customers.
15. Customer Support on Twitter
Free
Live tweets between users and brand support accounts? Yes please. This dataset shows real-world Q&A, tone shifts, and resolution flows in action.
16. DSTC6 & DSTC7 Track 1
Free
Built for dialog system challenges, these sets provide layered conversations with structured annotations—ideal for training smarter, multi-turn bots.
17. Dialogue Natural Language Inference (Dialogue NLI)
Free
If your chatbot needs to understand not just what is said, but what is implied—this is your dataset. Dialogue NLI teaches models how to reason through implication, contradiction, and neutrality in conversation.
Personalization & Context Retention
Generic bots are so 2018. In 2025, users expect their digital assistant to actually know them—remember their tone, pick up where they left off, and keep things feeling personal. These datasets help your chatbot sound less like a stranger and more like a thoughtful companion.
18. PChatbot
Free
PChatbot was born on the internet—literally. Pulled from social media convos, it’s designed to teach chatbots how to mirror users’ language and adapt to their vibe. If you want a bot that feels like it gets you, this one’s a winner.
19. DailyDialog
Free
Think small talk meets emotional intelligence. DailyDialog captures the flow of everyday conversations, complete with labels for topics and emotions. It’s perfect for bots that respond with empathy, not just facts.
20. LCCC (Large-Scale Chinese Conversation Corpus)
Free
Got your sights set on the Chinese market? LCCC delivers rich, informal open-domain dialogues straight from real online chatter. It’s built to make your bot feel local, relatable, and fluent in modern Mandarin internet lingo.
Final Thoughts
Good datasets = better conversations. It's that simple.
Whether you’re building a sassy AI friend, a support ninja, or a booking genius, the dataset you feed your model sets the tone—literally.
Keep it relevant
Keep it clean
Keep it real-world
And if you’re overwhelmed? Bookmark this list. Come back. Start small. Train smart.
