Finding standards

Standards are useful sources for:

• current thought and practices in specific industries
• detailed technical guidelines
• performance or quality guidelines
• terminology

What is a standard?

A standard is an officially approved specification which covers requirements for the properties, dimensions, performance, qualities and testing of products and services.

Standards can be:

• international (with worldwide coverage)
• regional (involving co-operation between two or more countries)
• national (covering a specific country or sector)

Finding relevant standards

Search British Standards Online

We subscribe to British Standards Online which gives the full-text of current, historic, and draft British standards and BSI adopted European and international standards.

Search Summon

Standards covered by our British Standards Online subscription can also be found using our discovery service Summon. One search in Summon will find information published in a wide variety of sources including standards, journal articles, book chapters and newspaper articles.

International Standards Organization (ISO)

You can find references to other international standards in the ISO Catalogue. You can also purchase online from this site.

Further help

Contact us if you need further help locating or using standards.