Open Textbooks for Reading Lists

Our Community of Practice is collecting examples of open textbooks which appear on reading lists at UK and Irish higher education institutions, which have been transformed into a UK and Ireland Collection within the OEN’s Open Textbook Library. The Collection shares the same format as the Open Textbook Library so you’re able to browse by subject and submit suggested titles for inclusion. Each title will be evaluated by members of our community according to the following criteria:

it has a Creative Commons licence (note: titles with ND are excluded)
it is a complete textbook (i.e. not a single chapter, lab manual, collection of slides)
it is available as a complete downloadable, portable file (e.g. PDF or EPUB)
the content meets quality and scope standards for higher education (relevant and well-structured)

Browse the Open Textbook Library UK & Ireland Collection

Explore the collection of open textbooks that appear on reading lists at higher education institutions in the United Kingdom & Ireland.

Open Textbook Reviews

If you are a member of the Open Education Network you can also ask your academic colleagues to write and publish reviews which will appear in the Collection. These reviews are critical to help improve OER adoption rates and academic engagement with OER. Visit the Open Education Network website or contact open@umn.edu to learn more.

Reading List Spreadsheets

As we expand the regional Open Textbook Library collection in line with inclusion criteria, we will continue compiling lists of open books on reading lists categorised under the broad subject headings below.

Click the subject area to peruse corresponding open textbook suggestions for that subject's reading lists. The linked spreadsheets show which institutions are using the books, of which we're aware, along with details such as the book's licence and a link to the source.

Contribute to the Collection

Following the workshop hosted in February 2026 demonstrating how to identify titles using Talis and Leganto, libraries have submitted several titles to be included in the collection.

We welcome data from other higher education institutions. If you have titles on your reading lists which are not currently in the UK - Ireland Collection and meet the criteria listed above, let us know! Please email a spreadsheet with the book's title, link, and open license to David Beales at david.beales@brunel.ac.uk. Once the second batch of records has been added to the Collection in Summer 2026, subsequent suggested titles will be transferred to the Collection on a regular basis.

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