Our commitment as a nonprofit

As a trusted, nonprofit organization, JSTOR has made a commitment across our products and services to provide equitable, sustainable models to maximize access to knowledge. 

Being an independent nonprofit uniquely allows us to operate between libraries and publishers and users, balancing their needs and interests—with the ultimate goal of providing equitable access to knowledge today and in the future. 

Our priorities and approach

Provide affordable access for everyone


Support sustainable open access content

Our partnerships with libraries and publishers help us grow open access through content and community initiatives that make more content discoverable and freely accessible worldwide, including:

  • Reveal Digital, a collaboration with libraries to fund, source, digitize, and publish open access primary source collections from under-represented voices
  • Path to Open, which offers a sustainable open access solution for libraries, supports the nonprofit university press community, and invests in authors, by making books in the program open access three years after publication
  • JSTOR Daily, which makes scholarship more accessible through engaging articles and free teaching resources that enrich learning in the humanities, arts, and social sciences—each linking to open and freely available content on JSTOR

Lead the preservation of scholarship

  • We have secured the needed rights to ensure content on JSTOR is accessible to libraries for the long-term, providing a trusted alternative to hard copies on shelves
  • Our digital content can be readily converted to newer formats as they are developed in the future
  • Digital files for the entire archive are preserved using the approach and infrastructure developed by Portico
  • Our archives can be transferred to a third-party steward in the extremely unlikely event that JSTOR should ever cease operations

Advance scholarship and teaching practices

The latest from JSTOR

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News

New Artstor on JSTOR Collection Launch: Asheville Art Museum 

Explore more than 1,500 images of American art from the Asheville Art Museum, including works by Black Mountain College artists Ruth Asawa and Robert Rauschenberg, glass artist Mark Peiser, and contemporary artist Wendy Red Star.

A colored engraving shows a geology lecture at Oxford. A lecturer stands beside a display of maps, rocks, fossils, and a skeleton while rows of male scholars watch from a crowded room. A large mounted antlered skull hangs on the paneled wall above them. The caption reads “The Geological Lecture Room, Oxford.”
Blog

Teach academic research with JSTOR: A flexible lesson plan

Help students move from a broad research topic to a focused, organized set of sources with this flexible JSTOR lesson plan. Designed for a 30–45-minute class or training session, it covers searching, evaluating materials, using Workspace, and citing sources. Adapt the activities and customizable slide deck to your students’ needs.

Screenshot of JSTOR’s homepage with the search box open. The query “social impacts of global trade” is entered in Dynamic search mode, with 125K results shown. Suggested searches below include “weather pattern changes in the fall in western US” and “social structure during the French revolution.” The page header reads “Explore the world’s knowledge, cultures, and ideas.”
Blog

Introducing AI-assisted dynamic search on JSTOR

JSTOR’s AI-assisted dynamic search helps researchers explore early questions by surfacing related ideas, vocabulary, and potentially relevant sources. Learn how it complements keyword search, keeps researchers in control, and will be introduced at participating institutions this fall.

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Event

Reconsidering your digital collections platform: Lessons from MTSU’s move from CONTENTdm to JSTOR Stewardship

Join us for a conversation with Kathleen Schmand (Dean, Walker Library) about Middle Tennessee State University’s move from CONTENTdm to JSTOR Stewardship. Hear how MTSU evaluated its options, worked with JSTOR’s migration team to prepare and move its collections, and what the transition has made possible.

Page 8 of the January 26, 1968, Los Angeles Free Press. The headline reads “Eartha Kitt wins hearts of black people,” above a multi-column article by Hakim A. Jamal. Ads for a printing service, a music group, and moccasins appear along the right side.
Blog

When distinctive collections become part of research

Libraries’ and archives’ collections shared through JSTOR Stewardship can become evidence for research, teaching, and public understanding.

Four book covers appear in a row against a dark red background: Zones of Encuentro: Language and Identities in Northern New Mexico by Lillian Gorman, Affective Bordering: Race, Deservingness and the Emotional Politics of Migration Control by Billy Holzberg, Postconflict Utopias: Everyday Survival in Chocó, Colombia by Tania Lizarazo, and Pitfalls of Prestige: Black Women and Literary Recognition by Laura Elizabeth Vrana.
Blog

Nearly 300 books in Path to Open will become open access in 2027

In January 2027, 300 books from Path to Open’s 2024 cohort will become open access on JSTOR. Spanning the arts, humanities, and social sciences, the titles build on the first cohort’s sharp increase in readership after going open.

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Blog

JSTOR Stewardship: A modern foundation

JSTOR rebuilt the infrastructure behind its Digital Stewardship Services while hundreds of institutions continued their work. Learn how this modernization supports accessibility, reliable maintenance, and more flexible ways to organize and connect digital collections.

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Event

JSTOR Digital Stewardship Services training: Project cataloging

Training for Stewardship participants (Tiers 2-3): catalog records, manage media, use linked fields, and organize work. One of three sessions in a monthly Stewardship training series.

Exhibition installation of Tewa Nangeh at the Georgia O’Keeffe museum featuring wall-based artworks across a central wall, flanked by 2 works on perpendicular walls.
Blog

Looking beyond Georgia O’Keeffe: How multidisciplinary research deepens understanding 

An exhibition at the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum invites viewers to reconsider O’Keeffe’s New Mexico landscapes through the perspectives of Tewa artists, scholars, and culture bearers. Explore how multidisciplinary research can deepen our understanding of art, place, and colonial history.