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Autocar is proud to announce the British Motor Museum as the new home of the physical Autocar Archive.

The Archive at the British Motor Museum in Gaydon, Warwickshire, is one of the world’s largest and most outstanding collections of magazines, photographs, drawings, motoring literature and film covering the motor car and Britain’s motor industry. 

The Autocar Archive has been available to access digitally since 2023 through a partnership with Exact Editions, and following the completion of that project, a new home has been sought for our physical copies and future bound volumes of our title, which turned 130 years old this week. The Archive at the British Motor Museum was the obvious choice and Autocar’s own volumes will shortly join the museum’s existing collection of Autocar magazines. 

Enjoy full access to the complete Autocar archive at the magazineshop.com

Following the digitisation and combining of our respective physical archives, some gaps have been identified in our collection, and Autocar and the British Motor Museum are inviting readers and collectors to contribute to the physical archive to make it whole. In the future, researchers visiting the museum in person will also be able to search Autocar’s digital archive through a dedicated terminal.

As part of the launch, Autocar editor-in-chief Steve Cropley and editor-at-large Matt Prior walked the museum for a special immersive episode of their My Week in Cars podcast, which is published today on all major podcast channels and can be found at the bottom of this article.

Autocar editor Mark Tisshaw said: “We’re delighted to be partnering with the British Motor Museum for this very special project. The Autocar Archive tells the history of the motor car in real time back to 1895 and the digitisation of the archive was a huge moment for the brand in making this accessible to all.

“There is no better place for our physical archive to reside, being so close to so many of the cars we have told the story of over the past 130 years.

“We would love to hear from any readers or collectors who can help make the archive a complete one and would urge anyone who would like to contribute to this project to reach out to the British Motor Museum.”

Stephen Laing, head of collections at the British Motor Museum said: “Our internationally recognised collections of cars, objects and archive material tell the myriad of stories behind the development of the car; the people who designed, built and sold them; and the growth of the motor industry since its inception.

“As the world’s longest-running car magazine, Autocar has provided a continuous commentary on the motor car for a century and more. Together we can continue to capture the stories from today and those in the future.”

A complete set of What Car? magazines, Autocar’s sibling title at publisher Haymarket Automotive, has also been donated to the British Motor Museum’s Archive as part of this partnership. What Car? dates back to 1973 and all future bound volumes of What Car? will head straight to Gaydon in the future.