Research underpins all core purposes of the British Library. We play a key role in the UK research community and work with national and international partners to support and stimulate research of all kinds.

We lead and support research projects, supervise a range of collaborative PhDs, research placements and fellowships, and run a regular programme of training events. Our staff have extensive research expertise and we contribute actively to the development of research policy.

You can read more about our activities in our 2017-18 Research Report.

(An older edition of the Research Report, covering the academic year 2016-17, is available here).


How we collaborate

Doctoral Students British Library

Doctoral research

We support postgraduate research through our Reading Rooms and online resources, through collaborative projects, and through research training events.

British Library partnership

Projects and partnerships

We actively lead on and support research.

A manuscript letter placed on a light box for conservation

Research expertise

Our research, professional and methodological expertise covers all disciplines and spans traditional and digital scholarship in all its forms.

A group of students sitting in a lecture room listening to a talk at a British Library Doctoral Open Day

Training and events

We convene and support research events and training activities throughout the year.

British Library policy development

Policy

As the national library of the United Kingdom, we are an integral part of the national research infrastructure and have an active approach to research and higher education policy.

Two men and a woman (staff members of the Eccles Centre) discussing a book

Proposing a new research collaboration with the British Library

An overview of the internal review process for new research collaboration proposals at the British Library.

News

Manuscript page from 'Ballade in A minor' by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor

New AHRC call: Celebrating Classical Composers from Diverse Ethnic Backgrounds

20 October 2020

British Library support for AHRC call 'Celebrating Classical Composers from Diverse Ethnic Backgrounds'

People walking towards the main entrance of the British Library

Towards a National Collection

8 April 2020

British Library involvement in AHRC Programme Towards a National Collection

Doctoral student and British Library curator looking at a selection of collection items.

Applying for collaborative PhD studentships

22 October 2020

Collaborative PhD opportunities

Blog posts

Maps of Jamaica in the K.Top. Collection

Monday, October 26, 2020

A guest post by Chantelle Richardson, Librarian of the National Library of Jamaica and former Chevening British Library Fellow Throughout my year at the British Library, I was privy to seeing some amazing resources. One of my projects focused on...

BL Labs Public Award Runner Up (Research) 2019 - Automated Labelling of People in Video Archives

Friday, October 23, 2020

People 'automatically' identified in digital TV news related programme clips. Guest blog post by Andrew Brown (PhD researcher), Ernesto Coto (Research Software Engineer) and Andrew Zisserman (Professor) of the Visual Geometry Group, Department of Engineering Science, University of Oxford, and...

The Botish Library: developing a poetry printing machine with Python

Tuesday, October 20, 2020

This is a guest post by Giulia Carla Rossi, Curator of Digital Publications at the British Library. You can find her @giugimonogatari. In June 2020 the Office for Students announced a campaign to fill 2,500 new places on artificial intelligence...

The 2020 British Library Labs Staff Award - Nominations Open!

Monday, October 19, 2020

Looking for entries now! Nominate an existing British Library staff member or a team that has done something exciting, innovative and cool with the British Library’s digital collections or data. The 2020 British Library Labs Staff Award, now in its...

More blog posts