- Who owns the Open Library catalog?
- I have a bunch of book records to share with Open Library. How do I do that?
- Can I download Open Library?
- Can I download a small piece of Open Library? Say, just three records?
- Can I export a bibliography?
- I'm a publisher. I have a CSV file of all our publications. Can I share that on Open Library?
- I work on a book-related website and would like to talk with someone about sharing information with Open Library. Who should I talk to?
- Back to FAQ
Who owns the Open Library catalog?
You do! Our catalog was created by the generous donations of libraries who dedicated their data into the public domain. Our data are available for bulk download in original form through the Internet Archive.
We ask that any and all contributions you make to Open Library be given under the following Creative Commons license: CC0 1.0 Universal license.
I have a bunch of book records to share with Open Library. How do I do that?
Please see the instructions on Bulk Uploading.
We acknowledge that this process is too clunky at the moment, but it's a start and something we're looking to improve upon. The goal is eventually enable a library of any size, whether personal or institutional, to upload its catalog or a part of its catalog to Open Library. We'd like to work on that this year and next.
Can I download Open Library?
Yes. There are a few different ways you can make use of Open Library.
A quick trip to the Developers section of the site will reveal that you can: a) install your own instance of Open Library, b) access Open Library data via a variety of APIs, or download the entire catalog.
Can I download a small piece of Open Library? Say, just three records?
The best way to download small sets of records is to make a List on Open Library, and then export it. You'll see the export options available on the List's main page.
We plan to explore partnerships or integrations with other open source Integrated Library Systems (ILS), with a view to providing easy access to small sets of free catalog records within in existing tools. It seems that it might be useful for a librarian to collect records around a particular topic using Open Library, and then use their existing ILS to access Open Library source records.
Can I export a bibliography?
Yes. Any List you create on Open Library can be exported in either HTML, JSON or BibTex.
I'm a publisher. I have a CSV file of all our publications. May I share that on Open Library?
We would love that. It's not possible yet, though. We're working on ways to make the addition of records to Open Library much, much easier. For us to be able to accept a CSV file from anywhere, we'll need to be sure that it contains the minimum fields we require to: a) check to make sure we wouldn't create a duplicate record; or b) create a new record. Stay tuned!
I work on a book-related website and would like to talk with someone about sharing information with Open Library. Who should I talk to?
Yay! Please email info@ and tell us about your website or organization and what you'd like to do.
History Created November 16, 2010 · 5 revisions
| April 13, 2011 | Edited by George | Updated some old answers. |
| April 13, 2011 | Edited by Anand Chitipothu | Removed references to upstream |
| November 16, 2010 | Edited by bookfinch | Edited without comment. |
| November 16, 2010 | Edited by bookfinch | updated links |
| November 16, 2010 | Created by bookfinch | Edited without comment. |