Members of the public are welcome to visit and use our University Libraries.
Please remember to bring valid photo ID when you visit any of our Libraries.
| Site | Open to visitors | How to visit |
|---|---|---|
| Hartley Library | 08:00 - 22:00 (Monday - Sunday) |
No appointment needed, |
| Health Services Library | 08:00 - 20:00 (Monday - Sunday) |
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| Winchester School of Art Library | 08:00 - 18:00 (Monday to Friday) |
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| National Oceanographic Library | 09:00 - 17:00 (Monday to Friday) |
Book an appointment time by contacting nolenqs@soton.ac.uk |
Visiting our Archives and Special CollectionsOur Archives and Special Collections are available to everyone.
Hartley Library houses our main Special Collections with around 7 million manuscript items and 50,000 printed books. Access to the Archives and Rare Books is by appointment but appointments are not required for the Open Access Special Collections. More information on the collections can be found on our webpages.
Access to the Archive at the National Oceanography Library is available by booking an appointment in advance (minium 24 hours needed to visit and request material)
Winchester School of Art Special Collections can be accessed by appointment.
We are happy to help with any enquiries relating to our collections. Please email to the addresses below for further information;
| Archives and Special Collections | Visiting hours | Book an appointment |
|---|---|---|
| Hartley Library Archives and Rare Books | 10:00 - 16:00 (Tue-Thurs by appointment) | Archives@soton.ac.uk |
| 09:00 - 17:00 (by appointment) | nolenqs@soton.ac.uk | |
| Winchester School of Art Special Collections | 09:00 - 18:00 | Libenqs@soton.ac.uk |
AlumniAs a member of the University of Southampton Alumni Society, you have access to the services and facilities of the Library. Full details of what the University offers are available from the Alumni website including information on how to order your Alumni ID Card.
Sconul Access Southampton University Library is a member of the SCONUL Access scheme.
Visiting us as part of SCONUL? Please bring your approval email from SCONUL and a valid University ID card to apply with us which allows many university library users to borrow or use books and journals at other libraries which belong to the scheme. The scheme covers most of the university libraries in the UK and Ireland.
If you are a full-time undergraduate SCONUL applicant (BAND R) you will be able to use our print collection as a Reader only.
SCONUL members are welcome to visit all of our libraries, to visit the National Oceanographic Library, contact the Library by emailing nolenqs@soton.ac.uk to arrange an appointment time to visit.
Students
Under 16s will need to be accompanied by an adult over the age of 21 (or their legal parent or guardian).
Ages 16-18 are welcome to sign in as a visitor and use the library study spaces and print resources as reference.
Please contact libenqs@soton.ac.uk if you have any questions.
Learn with US - group visits
Learn with US Transition is a University programme providing support to students at state schools in their preparation for study in Higher Education.
The University can provide support to students undertaking various research-based qualifications, such as Extended Project Qualification (EPQ). Find out more on the Learn with US transition team webpages
If you are a teacher and would like to arrange a group visit you can contact the Learn with US team here and fill out a request form.
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Books & print journal access
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Search the Library Catalogue from anywhere
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Connect to Guest WiFiTurn the WiFi on your device Select WiFi Guest from the available network list In the new window, please read the terms and conditions and select 'Continue' Sign in with your account or create a new one by filling out the form, select 'Continue' you are all set up when you see the Welcome page. |
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Library CafeFood and drink facilites are availble across the campuses. |
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Help DesksOur Library Help desks are staffed from 8am to 8pm. |
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Photocopying facilities are available for visitors. Register as a 'New Guest User' through myprint to set up an account. |
Open Access and Free Resources Access to online resources that the university has subscribed to is limited to members of the university. Alumni, Sconul and Public memberships will not be able to access them.
The resources listed below are freely available to anyone to read online. Unless indicated you don't need to be a member of the University to access them and the links will work using your own mobile device or laptop.
Download a browser extension to search
Unpaywall, OA Button and CORE Discovery are Chrome and Firefox extensions that find legal open access copies of individual articles from both publishers and repositories. They search open access content from thousands of publishers and repositiories making it easy to find and use.
Got an article you want to check?
You can paste an article DOI (the unique article identifier) into the OA Button and CORE Discovery search bars. Open Access Helper works the same way for iOS and Safari.
Test them out with this article: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-016-0002 (the article DOI is 10.1038/s41559-016-0002)
Google: if you find an article that is behind a paywall, try copy & pasting the article title into a search engine. If there is a copy in a repository it will often display on the first page of search results.
Articles can be made open access (OA) on the journal website (Publisher OA) or via institutional and subject repositories (green OA, often involving an embargo set by the journal publisher). Find out more about how to make your own work open access at http://library.soton.ac.uk/openaccess/options
Both Scopus and Web of Science have a filter to select only Open Access articles. They predominantly display articles that are gold OA, not the many thousands of articles that are green OA via repositories and preprint servers.
This link opens in a new windowCan’t find what you need? if you can’t find a legal open access version, use our interlibrary loan service and we will source a copy, often within 24 hours. Please do not spend your own money, or grant money, on journal articles. Find out more at https://library.soton.ac.uk/ill.
LibKey Nomad: part of our BrowZine subscription, LibKey Nomad is a browser extension that integrates with Wikipedia, publisher websites and PubMed to give you easy access to the full text of journal articles. If we do not have a subscription, LibKey Nomad uses data from Unpaywall to search for legal open access copies.
EndNote Click (formerly Kopernio): a Chrome extension that finds articles from our library subscriptions and open access versions.
This link opens in a new windowSee this helpful blog post from the University of Southampton Digital Learning Team for further suggestions for finding copyright-free images.
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