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
01
Provide affordable access for everyone
- We actively choose to keep fees low to reach more people, whether it’s our comprehensive model for journals and primary sources, or our diverse ebook models. We lead with our mission, one decision at a time
- Through the JSTOR Access Initiative, we provide free or very low-cost access to more than 1,500 institutions around the world
- With the JSTOR Access in Prison initiative, we provide JSTOR access to learners in jails and prisons
- Our free reading program makes scholarly journals accessible to everyone anywhere in the world, regardless of their ability to pay
02
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
03
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
04
Advance scholarship and teaching practices
- Our faculty resource library provides comprehensive support for teaching and learning
- JSTOR Workspace simplifies research organization and citation
- JSTOR’s AI-enabled explorations help people discover, evaluate, and engage with knowledge
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How Middle Tennessee State University planned its move from CONTENTdm to JSTOR Stewardship
Middle Tennessee State University evaluated seven digital collections platforms before selecting JSTOR Stewardship to replace CONTENTdm. Learn how staff from Walker Library and the Albert Gore Research Center aligned their needs, planned the migration of roughly 30 collections and more than 10,000 items, and are preparing to make distinctive materials easier for researchers to discover.
Are Libraries Prepared for the Second Digital Transformation of Distinctive Collections?
In The Scholarly Kitchen, Roger Schonfeld argues that libraries are entering a second digital transformation for distinctive collections, calling on library leaders to build an “activation infrastructure” that connects processing, digitization, and discovery to maximize their collections’ impact.
Activating distinctive collections: From digitization to discovery with JSTOR Stewardship
Join Roger Schonfeld (JSTOR Stewardship), Jamie Markus (University of Wyoming Libraries), and colleagues from JSTOR to explore how institutions can connect digitization, processing, preservation, and discovery to activate distinctive collections.
ITHAKA named an AWS Champion for JSTOR accessibility remediation work
ITHAKA has been named an AWS Champion for its work to make JSTOR PDFs and image alt text more accessible through on-demand remediation.
ITHAKA Fall 2026 Community Letter: AI at JSTOR
For decades, JSTOR has helped people discover trusted scholarship, understand scholarly context, benefit from library-supported access, and connect with original sources. As using AI becomes part of the research, teaching, and learning process, grounding the work in those principles becomes even more important.
What’s new in JSTOR Stewardship: September 2026
Meet the newest JSTOR Stewardship charter participants, explore distinctive collections now available on JSTOR, and discover recent conversations shaping the future of digital stewardship.
Northern Kentucky University joins JSTOR Digital Stewardship Services charter program
NKU joins the JSTOR Stewardship charter community to expand access to distinctive collections, build sustainable digital workflows, and connect materials with students, researchers, and regional communities.
What happened when the first Path to Open books became open access?
When 100 Path to Open titles became freely available worldwide, their readership quickly extended far beyond the institutions that had previously provided access.
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