Inference-Based Assignment of Data Type to Data

Embodiments associate a relevant semantic data type (e.g., date) with incoming raw data (e.g., a column of digits) which lacks metadata. Assignment of semantic data type is inferred from a plurality of features. A first step determines a first feature comprising success rate in converting the raw data into various semantic data types. Then, alignment between observed/reference distributions of other features (e.g., data first digit, data length) is determined per-semantic data type. Total scores for each semantic data type are calculated from the combined features, and used as a basis for ranking the semantic data types. The total scores may reflect a weighting of the various features. In a second step, top-ranked semantic data types may be further differentiated from one another by applying additional features. User feedback regarding accuracy of semantic data type assignment, may be incorporated into training data used to modify the feature reference distributions.