The University of Washington Libraries (UW Libraries) is the academic library system of the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW, simply Washington, or informally U-Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1861, Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast; it was established in Seatt ...

. The Libraries serves the

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest region o ...

, Tacoma, and

Bothell Bothell () is a city in King and Snohomish counties in the U.S. state of Washington. It is part of the Seattle metropolitan area, situated near the northeast end of Lake Washington. As of the 2020 census, it had a population of 48,161 resident ...

campuses of the

and the university's Friday Harbor Laboratories. The library system is the largest collection in the Pacific Northwest, closely followed by the

University of British Columbia Library The University of British Columbia Library is the library system of the University of British Columbia (UBC). The library is one of the 124 members of the Association of Research Libraries (ARL). In 2017, UBC Library ranked 29th among members of t ...

, and is among the largest academic research

libraries A library is a collection of Document, materials, books or media that are accessible for use and not just for display purposes. A library provides physical (hard copies) or electronic media, digital access (soft copies) materials, and may be a ...

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and th ...

. UW Libraries won the 2004 ACRL
Excellence in Academic Libraries Award
. Library, University of Washington campus, Seattle, 1922 (COBB 342)

The

Libraries have a collection of more than 9 million books, journals, millions of microforms, thousands of maps, rare books, film, audio and video recordings. The Libraries' website provides the connection to a wide range of print and electronic resources available in the Libraries and on the World Wide Web. The UW Libraries special collections holds over three-thousand audio recordings of Pacific Northwest indigenous languages. They document over fifty native dialects. Services and resources are provided primarily for University of Washington students, faculty, and staff as part of the Libraries' mission to support teaching, learning, research, and service at the University of Washington. Visitors who come to the Libraries are welcome to use most resources and many of the services. Researchers throughout the world have access to a broad range of materials and various interlibrary loan and document delivery services. The Libraries system is composed of the Suzzallo and Allen Libraries, the primary location for information and services in the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences; the Odegaard Undergraduate Library (OUGL) which houses the Odegaard Learning Commons and is open 24 hours weekdays during school days; the Health Sciences Library and Information Center (HSLIC); the East Asia Library; fifteen specialized branch libraries; the Bothell/CCC Library; and the Tacoma Library. The Marian G. Gallagher Law Library and Elisabeth C. Miller Library are administered separately from the UW Libraries system.

Library services

Library services include the library catalog, circulation services and

interlibrary loan Interlibrary loan (abbreviated ILL, and sometimes called interloan, interlending, document delivery, document supply, or interlibrary services, abbreviated ILS) is a service where patrons of one library can borrow materials and receive photocopies ...

, computing and copying/printing facilities, a grants and funding information service, instructional services, and

ADA Ada may refer to: Places Africa * Ada Foah, a town in Ghana * Ada (Ghana parliament constituency) * Ada, Osun, a town in Nigeria Asia * Ada, Urmia, a village in West Azerbaijan Province, Iran * Ada, Karaman, a village in Karaman Province, T ...

access for persons with disabilities.

Libraries and units

Art LibraryBuilt Environments LibraryUniversity of Washington Bothell and Cascadia College LibraryDrama Library
Of special note are the more than 14,000 acting editions and sound effects from the BBC, CBS and

Sound Ideas Sound Ideas is the repository of one of the largest commercially available sound effects libraries in the world. It has accumulated the sound effects, which it releases in collections by download or on CD and hard drive, through acquisition, exclu ...

.
Engineering Library
The library is a designated Patent and Trademark Depository Library and maintains a national depository for the

Association for Computing Machinery The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) is a US-based international learned society for computing. It was founded in 1947 and is the world's largest scientific and educational computing society. The ACM is a non-profit professional member ...

(ACM). Special resources include industry standards, technical reports, and U.S. patent specifications from 1966 to the present. * Foster Business Library
Friday Harbor Library
Special materials include collections of reprints, papers and theses based on research conducted at the Friday Harbor Laboratories.
Government Publications, Maps, Microforms & Newspapers CollectionsHealth Sciences Library
*International Studies **Near East **Slavic and East European **Southeast Asia
Mathematics Research LibraryMedia ArcadeMusic Library
**Music Listening Center. Among the special resources are the Eric Offenbacher Collection of pre-LP vocal recordings of the music of Mozart, the Hazel B. Kinsella Collection of American hymnals and tune books, the Melville Harris Collection of early disc and cylinder recordings of woodwind solos, and a collection of 17th and 18th century opera scores. * Odegaard Undergraduate Library (OUGL) *Reference and Research Services
Special Collections
* Suzzallo and Allen Libraries
Tateuchi East Asia LibraryUniversity of Washington Tacoma Library
*Other Libraries
Elisabeth C. Miller Library (University of Washington Botanic Gardens)

Marian G. Gallagher Law Library

References

External links

* {{Authority control

Libraries A library is a collection of Document, materials, books or media that are accessible for use and not just for display purposes. A library provides physical (hard copies) or electronic media, digital access (soft copies) materials, and may be a ...

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...

Libraries in Seattle