The National World War II Museum (“Museum”) permits the use of digital and photographic reproductions of its collections according to applicable rights and restrictions. Individuals or organizations that would like to obtain a reproduction must first obtain permission from the Museum.
Allowable Uses
We permit and encourage personal and educational use for unrestricted collection documents, images, audio, and video. High quality or high-resolution versions are available on request, for these purposes, with associated fees for duplication and delivery, and in some cases, digitization when the item hasn’t been previously digitized. Visit the Digital Collection at www.ww2online.org to see digitized collections to date. The Museum would like to hear how our collections have helped in your research and projects, so please contact us to let us know.
Use of the Museum’s images, audio, and video materials for publication, commercial use, or distribution requires written permission and licensing from the Museum Licensing fees apply in addition to any digitization, duplication, and delivery fees. Waivers for licensing fees for non-profit and scholarly projects may be granted at the Archives’ discretion. To request licensing authorization, fill out our rights and reproduction request form. If you have any questions, you may send an email to digital.collections@nationalww2museum.org or rights.manager@nationalww2museum.org. Our Fee Schedule can be found here.
Use of some restricted images, audio, and video collections material may also require authorization from other parties depending on the material.
Copyright, Rights, and Restrictions
The Museum’s collections are obtained from many sources and are intended primarily for research and educational purposes. Certain works may be protected by copyright or trademark, not governed by the Museum. Permission for use will be granted only to the extent of the Museum's ownership of the rights relating to your particular interest. The responsibility for ascertaining whether any additional rights exist, and for obtaining all necessary permissions, remains with the researcher. See the Museum’s Terms of Use and Copyright Policies for more information.
No Known Copyright Restrictions
The phrase “no known copyright restriction” means that the Museum has determined, to the best of its ability based on available information, that the content is unlikely to be protected by copyright and is likely in the public domain. However, copyright is often difficult to determine with certainty, so the phrase is intended to say that the Museum is unaware of any copyright restriction, but such restrictions may still exist. In addition, even if the content is unrestricted from a copyright standpoint, there may be other considerations that would limit your use, such as rights of privacy or publicity of the individuals featured in the images, or contractual restrictions.
The Museum will respond to initial requests in a timely manner and will generally fulfill requests within two weeks of receiving payment and permission form. Custom requests will take longer, contingent on the volume and complexity of the order.