NewspaperSG National Library Board Singapore

Overview

NewspaperSG is an online newspaper archive operated by the National Library Board (NLB) of Singapore. It provides free remote access to a digitised collection of Singapore and Malaya newspapers published since 1827, making it one of the most comprehensive historical newspaper archives in Southeast Asia.

History and Founding

NewspaperSG was launched on 28 January 2010. Its origins lie in a 2007 agreement between the National Library Board and Singapore Press Holdings (SPH) to make digitised articles of the Straits Times available for public access. At launch the archive included 14 newspaper titles. In December 2017 six additional newspapers were added, including the Syonan Shimbun (the Japanese occupation-era newspaper), the Malaya Tribune, and others, bringing the archive's scope to over 200 titles.

Collections and Holdings

The archive contains digitised content for newspapers published from 1827 onwards, with more than 220,000 newspaper issues digitised. The collection spans English, Chinese, Malay, Tamil, and Jawi-language titles. Notable historical papers include the Singapore Chronicle, the Singapore Free Press and Mercantile Advertiser, Nanyang Siang Pau (南洋商报), Berita Harian, and Tamil Murasu. SPH-owned titles such as the Straits Times and the Business Times are available remotely up to 1989; content published after that date is accessible only through on-site Library Multimedia Stations at NLB libraries.

The Lee Kong Chian Reference Library (LKRCL) additionally holds approximately 30,000 microfilm reels containing surrogates of rare and out-of-print newspapers and books.

Notable Materials for Journalism Research

NewspaperSG is invaluable for researching the history of journalism in Singapore and the broader Malay world. The archive allows full-text searching of digitised content using optical character recognition (OCR), including a Search Term Visualiser that charts keyword frequency over time. It documents colonial-era, wartime, and post-independence press history across multiple language communities.

Access and Usage

NewspaperSG is freely accessible at eresources.nlb.gov.sg/newspapers. Most pre-1989 content is available remotely without login. Post-1989 SPH content requires an NLB account and on-site access.