Reading rooms at the National Library of Scotland
With a library card you can use the National Library of Scotland's reading rooms. NLS is not a lending library, so you have to consult material in the reading rooms or, where available, online. Please read our terms and conditions before you visit.
We have four reading rooms in two buildings. We keep books and journals in both buildings and transfer them on request to the appropriate reading room by a regular van service.
We encourage you to preorder material where appropriate. There is information about this in each reading room section in this part of the website.
George IV Bridge Building
- General Reading Room — for journals, newspapers, and most post-1850 printed books not covered by the specialist reading rooms.
- Special Collections Reading Room — for manuscripts, music and rare books (pre-1851 printed books and all printed books in special collections).
- Multimedia Room — for microforms and multimedia.
For new readers we offer orientation tours of the George IV Bridge Building reading rooms and readers' workshops.
We also have information on access and facilities at George IV Bridge for people with disabilities.
Causewayside Building
- Maps Reading Room — for maps, atlases, gazetteers, and cartographic reference books.
We also have information on access and facilities at Causewayside for people with disabilities.