1M pages of his historical British newspapers free to explore online
158 historical newspapers spanning 1720 to 1880 are now free to search and explore online, with 2.7 million more pages to be added by 2025
Following the renewal of their long-term partnership, Findmypast and The British Library have pledged to make millions of historical newspaper pages free to view online.
As of now, over one million pages are free to search and explore on both the British Newspaper Archive and Findmypast websites, which will be expanded by more than 2.7 million additional free pages over the next four years.
There are currently 158 free titles to explore, dating from 1720 to 1880. The newspapers selected were digitised as part of four special British Library projects, including:
• 19th Century Newspapers: a project funded by the
Joint Information Systems Committee and the British Library’s first major newspaper digitisation programme
• Heritage Made Digital newspapers: an ongoing project to transform digital access to rare and early newspapers, focusing on newspapers in a poor or unfit condition
• Living with Machines: another ongoing project, jointly led by the
Library and the Alan Turing Institute, which has been digitising selected UK regional newspapers as part of a major study of the British industrial age and using artificial intelligence tools to undertake new kinds of historical enquiry
• The Endangered Archives Programme: a project that facilitates the digitisation of archives around the world that are in danger of destruction, neglect or physical deterioration
Findmypast’s use of Optical Character Recognition and machine learning means researching these historically significant titles is accessible to all, allowing users to search billions of lines of printed text by name, date, keyword or phrase.
Anyone wishing to explore these titles and their contents will still need to register a free account with either Findmypast or the British Newspaper Archive before accessing, though no charge will be made for their use. Options to filter searches by ‘Free Access’ titles only are available on both sites.