Learn about the wide range of services the Archives of Ontario offers to the public, including photocopies and reproductions.

If you require assistance using these tools or accessing our collections, please contact us.

Although unable to do your research for you, our reference staff are available to help with your research, find answers to your questions and to assist you in using our collections and resources. They provide the Archives’ customers with frontline reference service in the Archives’ Reading Room and respond to a wide array of reference inquiries both in person and from a distance.

Reference staff serve a wide range of the general public, including genealogical researchers, cultural producers, historians, students, academics and officials from within the Government of Ontario who require archival documents for the completion of their work.

The Archives offers a range of reproduction services. To find out more information about these services and how to order, please see our guide to ordering reproductions and photocopies.

Most of the records managed by the Archives of Ontario are located in off-site storage and only the most frequently requested records are located in our facility. Retrievals staff work with customers to ensure that the records they are looking for are available for viewing in our Reading Room. Customers are encouraged to request material in advance of visiting the Archives of Ontario. In the event you have a question about our records or customer services please contact our Reference Desk at reference@ontario.ca.

The Microfilm Interloan Service allows you to borrow microfilmed archival records through a library or another institution belonging to the interlibrary loan network. About 32,000 of our most popular microfilm reels are available through interloan. As a result, you may be able to do extensive research without coming to the Archives of Ontario. The material available through interloan will be most useful to people doing genealogical research about their family, but it will undoubtedly be of interest to other researchers as well.

The Archives of Ontario maintains an exciting traveling exhibits loan program that showcases the Archives holdings in a variety of subject-based exhibits. The exhibits (which are also featured as online exhibits on the website) enable thousands of people from around the province to view selections from the Archives’ holdings in an informative and accessible format.

The Archives of Ontario provides public tours of its amazing facilities. The tours offer an introduction to our public spaces, including the Reading Room, as well as a rare opportunity to see some of the most cutting-edge archival facilities in Canada, such as our Preservation Services lab and our records storage vaults.