The Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) is the world’s largest open access digital library for biodiversity literature and archives. A global consortium of over 660 contributors, BHL has made more than 63 million pages of biodiversity knowledge freely accessible online. As a cornerstone of biodiversity data infrastructure, it contains the foundation of our understanding of the natural world.
For the past 20 years, the Smithsonian Institution – one of BHL’s 10 founding members – has played the vital role of hosting both the administrative and technical components of BHL. On January 1, 2026, the Smithsonian will no longer host the administrative functions of BHL. This change presents both a new challenge and a new opportunity.
What does this mean if you are a BHL user?
BHL is not going away. The content, data, and persistent identifiers (including DOIs) will remain secure, discoverable, and openly accessible.
What does this mean if you contribute content to BHL?
Your content and contributions are safe. All data and DOIs will remain secure within BHL.
What happens next?
This transition opens the door to a reimagined and more sustainable future for BHL. The consortium is currently exploring a range of options, including (but not limited to) identifying a new administrative host (or hosts) and refining potential organizational models. A more detailed summary of these possibilities will be released in the coming weeks. We welcome your ideas, feedback, inquiries, and support as we plan for the next chapter of BHL.
What can you do?
- Contact us with your inquiries, expressions of interest, and support.
- Donate to BHL
- Share the hashtag: #ILOVEBHL
About BHL
BHL is a global consortium of member organizations that contribute annual membership fees, in-kind contributions, and – most importantly – content. The consortium is currently run by a small secretariat (~3.25 full time positions) and a technical team (~1.25 full time positions). Its working data (~250 GB) and software is hosted on 7 servers (4 physical, 3 virtual) at the Smithsonian Institution. BHL’s 40 terabytes of digitized images, data, and OCR text are generously hosted free of charge by the Internet Archive and the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Open Data Sponsorship Program.
David Iggulden is Head of Data and Digital in the Library, Art and Archives at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and serves as Chair of BHL's Executive Committee (EC). He is responsible for leading all digital initiatives and activities within Kew’s Library, Art & Archives and also those delivered in collaboration with external partners including BHL. David provides leadership in coordination with fellow EC members and the BHL Secretariat on behalf of the BHL Members' Council.
Thank you for providing such an amazing service for all those who do any sort of biological research. I am merely a hobbyist entomologist, but this site has been so useful to my continued learning and research. I’ve sent a small donation, and I hope I can support in more ways in the future.
Hannah, thank you so much for your kind words and for your donation! You support is very much appreciated.
Dear David Iggulden,
Thank-you for your recent blog post on the future challenges of the BHL.
For what it’s worth, the BHL has proved indispensible (and I mean indispensible), for my work on the development of an annotated catalogue of the lichens and allied fungi of Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. I depend on BHL for the vast majority of publications in which the lichen and fungal taxa are originally published. The Province of Newfoundland and Labrador is home is a rich lichen diversity, our knowledge of which continues to grow with increasing collection and identification efforts. Several taxa new to science have been described and many new records for Canada and North America are based on this research. Continued efforts will only increase that number. Regular access to the wonders and technical marvels of the BLH are fundamental to that biodiversity research. Wishing you creative efforts that will lead you and your colleagues to an enduring and sustainable future for BHL. Sincerely, John McCarthy, SJ
John, thank you so much for your thoughtful message and kind words of support.
It’s encouraging to hear how indispensable the Biodiversity Heritage Library has been to your research. You have demonstrated exactly why BHL exists: to support biodiversity research across the globe by making critical literature freely accessible.
We’re honored that BHL has played a role in your important research. I’ll share your message with the broader BHL team. It’s the kind of encouragement that fuels our commitment as we navigate this transition.
What does this change mean for the URL’s?
I have a lot of links in my website to particular articles, and to particular pages inside the articles.
Will these still be working then?
Kind regards
R. Kapeller
Dear R. Kapeller,
Thank you for your question and for your support of BHL. We understand how important stable links are for research, education, and public engagement.
The BHL website, content, and URLs are not going away. Even as we transition away from the Smithsonian’s administrative and technical hosting, preserving access and link stability is a top priority. We are taking every measure to ensure that our persistent URLs – including links to individual articles and specific pages – remain intact and fully functional throughout and after the transition.
We will continue to provide updates via our BHL blog, including any technical developments. We encourage you to reach out if you have any further questions or concerns.
With thanks again for using and linking to BHL.