Objective: There is a dearth of research into the quality of assessments based on Multiple Choice Question (MCQ) items in Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs). This dataset was generated to determine whether MCQ item writing faws existed in a selection of MOOC assessments, and to evaluate their prevalence if so. Hence, researchers reviewed MCQs from a sample of MOOCs, using an evaluation protocol derived from the medical health education literature, which has an extensive evidence-base with regard to writing quality MCQ items. Data description: This dataset was collated from MCQ items in 18 MOOCs in the areas of medical health education, life sciences and computer science. Two researchers critically reviewed 204 questions using an evidence-based evaluation protocol. In the data presented, 50% of the MCQs (112) have one or more item writing faw, while 28% of MCQs (57) contain two or more faws. Thus, a majority of the MCQs in the dataset violate item-writing guidelines, which mirrors fndings of previous research that examined rates of faws in MCQs in traditional formal educational contexts.