Geotechnical engineering projects in current research and practice are increasingly undergoing geospatial analysis based on geologic and geotechnical data collected. The explosion of spatial data that is available for surface features, particularly from the raster based products, heavily used by commercial and available to the public, present only one dimension of site characterization. Geotechnical engineers are more interested in data with depth immediately below their project site retrieve from drilled and imaged subsurface surveys. The ability to optimize the use of new and existing subsurface data continues to be undermined by the lack of a common and agreed data format and structure. Over the past decade several initiatives have tried to develop some consensus, with limited success. The latest initiative for a common geotechnical data exchange standard is also described. Several projects based on the authors, experience are featured in this paper and serve as examples of the challenge of working with large and diverse subsurface geotechnical databases. Additionally, an update of a geotechnical data exchange format is also presented to point the direction for the future.