Digitise your collections
We can help your organisation share your physical archive with the digital world, or digitise an individual item from our collection.
Open up your collection
Take a look at our digitisation brochure (PDF, 1.1MB) to learn more about Digitisation Services and how we can help you.
What we do
- Support with getting your digitisation project started, such as scoping, funding advice and prepping your items
- Specialist scanning of all types of media
- Multispectral assessment to see beyond the surface
- Location photography, so your precious items don’t have to travel
- Images from our collection of over 170 million books, maps, manuscripts and more
- High quality printing
That’s just the start of our services. We take a holistic approach to every project, and will work with you to find the right solution to meet your needs.
Why digitise?
Digitisation helps you to:
- Preserve your items for the future
- Open up your collection to people around the world
- Present your items in more accessible ways
- Boost income for your organisation
- Save on physical storage space
We’ve been digitising for over 30 years from our studios in London and Boston Spa. As the guardians of the nation’s treasures, we’re world-leaders in handling rare, fragile material. And you can trust our expert conservators to take as much care with your collection as we did with Magna Carta.
Online ordering
Our online service allows individuals, academics and researchers to order digitised items directly from our collections. Our service is currently in beta testing. While we make every attempt to fulfil your order as described, there may be delays while we test and improve this service. To find out more about how to directly order, please click on our order form. Use our rate card (PDF, 309.7KB) to find out more about rates.
For wider business digitisation projects, please contact businessdevelopment@bl.uk.
Required information for your order
You will need the following information to proceed with your order:
- The British Library shelfmark of the items you would like to order from our catalogues.
- The title of the items you want to order.
- The page or folio numbers you would like us to scan or photograph.
In the case of folios, please state whether front, back (or both) is required. Unlike pages, these have the same number for both sides of the leaf. The front is called 'recto' and is often abbreviated as r or a. The back of the leaf is called 'verso' and is usually abbreviated as v and sometimes referred to as b.
When ordering manuscripts, the page numbers are identified by the pencil markings on the top of the page. Some manuscripts may contain further numbering, please ignore these and use the pencil markings. - The format:
Digital image for reference: this means that your image will be produced from scanning the original item. If your order is from a precious or rare item, it may need expert photography. If this is the case, we will contact you.
Digital image for reproduction: this means that your image will be photographed and reproduced in high quality. You can use the image as required, including for reproduction and publication, as long as you have the right permissions.
We are unable to provide scanned copies from original manuscripts. Scans are only available from surrogate copies. - Your payment details: credit or debit card details or British Library business account. For a list of our prices, please click here.
- Additional information: for example please state if ‘picture only’ is required. Please note, where a surrogate exists scans will be taken from the microfilm and will be in black and white. If colour is required please add this request to the additional information.
- How you want your order delivered. (NB our standard method of delivery is electronic. If you require another format please contact us.
Please note that there are some restrictions on what and how we can copy items from our collection. You should also check how you can use the images you order from us to make sure that you will have the permission to use your images in the way you want. There may be copyright in the images we supply. If you would like to reproduce copies of these images, please email licensing@bl.uk for more information.
Once you have placed your order we will contact you by email or phone if there are any questions or issues relating to your order.
If you require any further information please contact us.
Our work
The Malmesbury Bible
Our location photography service meant that the precious 600-year-old Bible could be digitised without leaving its home in Malmesbury Abbey. The stunning images faithfully reproduce the colours and gold leaf of the pages, while revealing decoration that wouldn’t be possible to see with the naked eye.
The Royal Society of Chemistry
We digitised over 750,000 items from the Royal Society of Chemistry’s archives, so that they could share their collections with their members and new audiences around the world. This included scanning of over 1,000 glass lantern slides using our specialist equipment.
The University of Warwick
We worked with the University of Warwick to convert more than 1,000 doctoral theses from microfilm to digital with our state-of-the-art microfilm scanner. This project opened up valuable research to new generations of researchers, so that they could learn from previous studies and push their own work further.
Contact us
If you’ve got a digitisation project in mind, please get in touch.
Email businessdevelopment@bl.uk.