TitleThe British National Bibliography (BNB)
Web site addresshttp://www.bl.uk/bibliographic/natbib.html
Start dateNew books and serials have been recorded in the BNB since 1950.
Period covered1950 to date
Current sizeOver 3 million records
Media coveredBooks, serials, electronic publications.
General selection criteriaThe British National Bibliography (BNB) is the national bibliography of the United Kingdom. It lists and describes the books and serials newly published or distributed in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland that are received by the British Library under legal deposit as provided for in various Acts of Parliament. It also includes information on forthcoming titles supplied under the British Library’s Cataloguing-in-Publication Programme.
Selection criteria for digital resourcesThe coverage of the BNB was widened to include electronic publications following the extension of legal deposit to this class of material in 2003.
Exclusions policies appliedThe coverage of the BNB has always been selective. See list at: http://www.bl.uk/bibliographic/exclude.html with the emphasis being on mainstream monographs available through normal book buying channels.
Primary organisation responsible for national bibliographic controlThe British Library. See: http://www.bl.uk
Web site address of national bibliographic agencySee details at: http://www.bl.uk/bibliographic/main.html 
Co-operative structures or  relationships supporting the production of the national bibliography The BNB is created in partnership with the five other British and Irish libraries allowed by law the privilege of legal deposit, under the Legal Deposit Libraries Shared Cataloguing Programme (LDLSCP). See: http://www.bl.uk/bibliographic/clscp.html 
Single integrated or multiple categorised bibliographiesThe BNB is a single integrated online database.
Sources of bibliographic metadata used to produce national bibliographySources of bibliographic metadata used to produce the BNB include: CIP data, LDLSCP data, in-house created records, and derived catalogue data from a variety of sources.
Relationship to national legal deposit legislation or voluntary deposit arrangementsUK and Irish publishers are obliged by law to send a copy of all new publications, including serial titles, to the Legal Deposit Office of the British Library. (See: http://www.bl.uk/aboutus/stratpolprog/legaldep/index.html ). 
Relationship to national Cataloguing in Publication (CIP) programmeThe British Library coordinates the UK CIP Programme and includes CIP records in the BNB. See http://www.bl.uk/bibliographic/cip.html for further details. Iinformation on new titles appears up to 16 weeks ahead of the announced publication date. Advance information on well over 50,000 titles each year is provided in this way.
Media & format options
The BNB is available as follows:
* Online at http://bnb.bl.uk/
* A free weekly PDF of new titles added to BNB is available from http://www.bl.uk/bibliographic/natbibweekly.html
* As linked open data. Details are at http://www.bl.uk/bibliographic/datafree.html
* In RDF/XML. Details are at http://www.bl.uk/bibliographic/datafree.html
Access options to national bibliographic metadata
The BNB records
are available:
* Via our
free z39.50 service. For details see: http://www.bl.uk/bibliographic/marcdownload.html
* Under
licence as a regular MARC21 exchange file supplied via ftp. For details contact [email protected]
Metadata enhancements offered via online servicesOnline services include links to book jackets, reviews and table of contents information.
Web 2.0 services offeredNone
Frequency of service updates * The BNB
online is updated daily.
* The BNB
MARC 21 exchange files are available weekly.
*
The PDF of new titles is available weekly.
Target audiences for servicesAcademic, specialist and public libraries in the UK and overseas. Members of the public via online services.
Uses made of services offered * Notification of new and forthcoming
publications for selection and acquisition.       
* Reference queries.
* Deriving of high quality catalogue records for inclusion in local
catalogues.
* Retrospective conversion.
Pricing policy for national bibliographic servicesWeekly MARC 21 files are licensed on a for-profit
basis. All other access is free.
Availability of metadata for re-use* British Library records are supplied exclusively under license, whether they are obtained directly from the Library or indirectly from an accredited supplier
* Organizations wishing to re-supply British Library records, or make them available in commercial transactions, are invited to contact us to discuss their requirements. Licensing of British Library records for redistribution is subject to the payment of an annual fee. 
* End-users wishing to retain British Library records within their organisation, to support internal operations such as cataloguing, inter-library loans, reference and enquiries, etc, are issued with a licence when starting their subscription. The licence for end-users is free of charge.
Metadata formats MARC21, MARCXML, RDF/XML
Cataloguing codeAACR2
Levels of description offeredAACR Level 2
Subject standardsDDC, LCSH
Name authority standardsNACO
Is NBA affiliated to IFLA SC?Yes
Date information submitted 13/2/2012
Information supplied by Brenda Young, Metadata Systems, Metadata Services, Operations & Services