McGill University Libraries

McGill University Libraries is the library system of McGill University in Montréal, Québec, Canada. It comprises 13 branch libraries, located on the downtown Montreal and Macdonald campuses, holding over 11.78 million items. It is the fourth-largest research intensive academic library in Canada.

The largest of the branch libraries is the Humanities and Social Sciences Library, which is housed in the McLennan and Redpath Library Buildings. The Humanities and Social Sciences Library has notable collections in Canadian Studies, English and American Literature, British History, Russian and East European Studies, and World War II.

The Library's ROAAr Group was formed in 2016 to unite Rare Books and Special Collections, The Osler Library of the History of Medicine, The Visual Arts Collection, and Archives and Records Management.

Rare Books and Special collections contains holdings on a variety of subjects, including art and architecture, Canadiana, history, literature, the history of ideas, travel and exploration, and the history of the book. The Lawrence Lande Collection of Canadiana consists of 12,000 items, including books, pamphlets, maps, prints, periodicals, government documents, and broadsides.

The Osler Library of the History of Medicine, in the McIntyre Medical Building, is Canada's foremost scholarly resource in the history of medicine, and one of the most important libraries of its type in North America. As of 2011, the Humanities and Social Sciences Library and the Schulich Library of Physical Sciences, Life Sciences, and Engineering are open 24/7 in most cases during midterms and finals during the academic year.

The Islamic Studies Library, located in Morrice Hall with the McGill University Institute of Islamic Studies that prepares graduate students for M.A. and Ph.D. degrees, is one of the largest collections of its kind in Canada.

The McGill University Libraries' Cyberthèque – a large-scale, multi-purpose information facility – opened its doors to McGill students in 2008. Located in the Redpath Library Building at street level, the "experiential" Cyberthèque blends a diverse range of studying and learning spaces for groups and individuals, various technology and multi-media installations, and timely assistance in accessing and using information. This unique facility was designed by Montréal architect François Emond and his team at ékm architecture together with Douglas Birkenshaw, and his team at Bregmann + Hamann from Toronto.

The Library is a member of the Canadian Association of Research Libraries, the Association of Research Libraries (ARL), and the Conférence des recteurs et des principaux des universités du Québec (CREPUQ), as well as other cooperative groups. The Library is a contributor to the Open Content Alliance