Presidential Library Explorer
Welcome to NARA's Presidential Library Explorer. Permanent records from presidential administrations are held by NARA at their respective Presidential Libraries.
This visualization presents the holdings of the Presidential Libraries in descending order from the library with the largest number of textual records to the smallest.
Volume of Textual Records
% / # Textual Records Scanned
Additional Records Online
About the Presidential Library Explorer Numbers
The Presidential Library Explorer data visualization is based on a count of the scans of textual pages available through the National Archives Catalog and an estimate of the total number of textual pages currently in Presidential Library holdings. Numbers will be updated monthly to reflect new additions to the Catalog and future iterations of the Explorer will provide additional data on records types other than textual records.
How Presidential Library Explorer Numbers are Calculated
The number of scans online uses file counts accessed via the National Archives Catalog API.
The estimated total pages in each Library is calculated by taking the volume of textual records (in cubic feet) and multiplying by an average of 2,500 pages of records per cubic foot. The 2,500 page average coming from historical capacity estimates for a Federal Records Center (FRC) box used to store archival documents.
The percent of scanned textual pages online equals scans online / estimated total pages
About Record Groups
NARA arranges its holdings into numbered Record Groups, each of which comprises the records of a major government organization such as a bureau or an independent agency. For example, National Archives Record Group 29 (or RG 29) is the "Records of the Bureau of the Census." Most Record Groups also include records of any predecessors to the organization named in the title. The number assigned to a record group reflects the order in which it was established by NARA.
A few Record Groups combine the records of several small or short-lived agencies having an administrative or functional relationship with each other. An example of this type of record group is Record Group 76, Records of Boundary and Claims Commissions and Arbitrations.
Several Records Groups have been cancelled or retired and are no longer in use. These records may have been merged with another Record Group or reappraised as temporary (and thus no longer retained by the National Archives as permanent records).