Seats available for users at 31 March 2009	Reader desks	Other provision 1
Humanities Floor 1 and 2 Reading Rooms	436	85
Rare Books & Music Reading Room	293	67
Maps Reading Room	49	20
Asian & African Studies Reading Room (formerly known as Oriental and India Office Reading Room)	83	48
Manuscripts Reading Room	72	21
Philatelic Collections	1	0
Science Reading Rooms	128	58
Business and IP Centre	100	58
Social Sciences Reading Room	50	27
Newspapers (Colindale)	77	77
Boston Spa Reading Room	76	16
TOTAL	1,365	477

Notes

¹This includes seats provided at the British Library Integrated Catalogue screens, electronic database terminals, microform readers and carrels (the individual study booths in the Reading Rooms).

Records in British Library catalogues and databases at 31 March 2009	2008/09	2007/08
British Library Integrated Catalogue 1, 2	12,506,391	12,243,857
Access to archives 2, 3	593,338	593,338
Asia, Pacific & Africa Collections – Japanese and Chinese 2, 4	63,621	58,923
Allied and Complementary Medicine (AMED)	230,091	219,959
British National Bibliography (BNB)	2,794,006	2,681,836
Sound Archive Catalogue 2	3,134,287	3,102,434
English Short Title Catalogue (ESTC)2	477,300	473,591
Incunable Short Title Catalogue (ISTC) 2	29.993	29,813
Electronic table of contents 2, 5	35,253,510	32,787,442
International Standard Serial Numbers (ISSN) UK Centre	125,909	94,202
Manuscripts 2	818,037	809,722
Newspapers 2,6	55,761	56,049
Register of Preservation Surrogates	217,967	215,095
TOTAL7	56,300,211	53,366,261

Notes

¹Number of unique records. A project to remove any duplication is ongoing.

²Available from the Library’s website.

³Conversion of printed catalogues to electronic versions for inclusion on the Access to Archives website hosted by the National Archives, was completed in 2006/07 and therefore this figure has remained the same in 2008/09.

⁴All other Asia, Pacific and Africa Collection material, except for Japanese and Chinese material, is included in the British Library Integrated Catalogue.

⁵A database listing articles and conference papers by title, derived from the top 20,000 research journals. The database is available through British Library Direct and to higher education through zetoc.mimas.ac.uk.

⁶The decrease in 2008/09 is due to some titles previously included in the count of newspaper records have been recategorised as serials.

⁷The total does not represent the number of unique records. There is significant overlap between some files e.g. British National Bibliography and British Library Integrated Catalogue.

Collection Holdings at 31 March 2009	2008/09	2007/08
Monographs 1	13,735,633	13,706,861
Serial titles (all) 2	826,112	828,928
Manuscripts (single and volumes)	347,263	341,949
India Office records 4	452,175	452,150
Philatelic items	8,265,391	8,261,791
Cartographic items	4,343,842	4,335,542
Music scores	1,604,779	1,601,330
Sound discs	1,452,997	1,430,899
Sound tape items	244,494	243,768
Digital Audio Files4	14,843	7,732
Videos	32,029	30,747
Prints and drawings	33,060	33,041
Photographs	294,220	289,891
Patent specifications5	58,892,064	62,508,920
Reports in microform	10,330,059	10,288,915
Theses	171,627	164,295
TOTAL	101,040,588	104,526,759

Notes

¹ The figure for monographs is based on the number of records in the relevant catalogues. This figure includes an estimate of items covered by card catalogues.

² The figure for serials titles is based on the number of records in the relevant catalogues. Changes of title are therefore counted as separate titles. This figure includes an estimate of items covered by card catalogues. A significant project has been undertaken to de-duplicate serial holdings. This rationalised database more accurately reflects the number of unique titles held.

³ The archives of the India Office (1858–1947) and its predecessors, including the East India Company (1600–1858).

⁴ Digital audio files are now used extensively and have largely taken over from sound tape items.

⁵ The reduction in 2008/09 is due to the de-accessioning of pre-2003 paper based US patents. Access to both paper and electronic copies of these specifications is available at the National Archive and Records Administration (NARA), Washington.

Use of www.bl.uk	2008/09	2007/08
Unique hosts served 1	6,211,722	6,060,362
Successful requests for pages 2	77,273,030	69,788,291

Notes

¹Unique hosts served is the best approximation available to the number of individual users of the website.

² The number of pages of all types viewed on the website. Every landing on every page is counted in this figure.

Kilometres of shelving and percentage occupied	2008/09	2007/08
Working capacity: linear km 1	655.0	655.0
Extent of collection: linear km2	648.4	641.4
Percentage occupied 3	99.00%	97.92%

Notes

¹ Working capacity represents the linear length of the solid stock, plus the associated growth spaces without which the collection could not be used and added to effectively.

² During 2008/09 the gross increase in the extent of the material acquired by the Library was 11.5 linear km. The net increase in the extent of the collection was reduced to 7 linear km through the de-accessioning of material in line with British Library Board policy.

³ The Library's new high-density store at Boston Spa was completed in 2008/09 and will provide an additional 262 linear kms of storage. Preparations for the start of the move of stock into the building are progressing.

Preservation funding	2008/09	2007/08
	£000	£000
Grant in Aid	6,198	6,094
Donations/external funds 1	165	45
Sales income	278	251
TOTAL	6,641	6,390

¹ The increase in 2008/09 is mainly due to funds received for LIFE2, the second phase of the LIFE (Lifecycle Information for E-Literature) project.

Items preserved 5	2008/09	2007/08
Conservation and/or rebinding	4,358	5,460
New binding	36,523	36,330
Minor repairs	3,403	7,845
Boxing/other work	9,126	9,187
Preservation microfilming 2	15,691	18,042
TOTAL	69,101	76,864

Preservation microfilming 3	2008/09	2007/08
Newspapers: frames of film 4	16,025,582	18,702,845
Books, periodicals, record volumes, manuscripts: frames of film	1,429,756	1,367,790
TOTAL	17,455,338	20,070,635

Notes

¹ Fluctuations in figures are due to the normal variations which occur annually when treating a wide range of non-standard items with variable resources and priorities.

² This figure is the approximate number of volumes equivalent to the frames shown under the heading 'preservation microfilming'.

³ One frame equates to one camera exposure. These generally represent either a single or double page of a monograph, newspaper or periodical. For most programmes, a negative, positive and duplicate are taken of each page. Consequently the number of frames shown does not represent the number of pages for which surrogate copies have been made.

⁴ The decrease from the previous year is due to a reduction in expenditure on newspaper programmes for 2008/09 plus an increase in costs.

⁵ Fluctuations in figures are due to the normal variations which occur annually when treating a wide range of non-standard items with variable resources and priorities.