The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is widely regarded as the accepted authority on the English language. It is a guide to the meaning, history, and pronunciation of 600,000 words— past and present—from across the English-speaking world, traced through 3 million quotations, from classic literature and specialist periodicals to films scripts and cookery books. Every three months updates to OED revise existing entries and add new words.
To find out how OED works, you can Take a Tour. The tour is in PowerPoint Show (.pps) format. You will need Microsoft PowerPoint or PowerPoint Viewer to watch it, you can download the free PowerPoint Viewer from the Microsoft Download Center.
Oxford University Press also offers a free site, Oxford Dictionaries Online, that focuses on current language and practical usage. It is a comprehensive current English dictionary, grammar guidance, puzzles and games, and a language blog; as well as up-to-date bilingual dictionaries in French, German, Italian, and Spanish. ODO can be added as an option to your Firefox search menu, see Add-ons.
| Name | Oxford English Dictionary |
| Publisher/Provider | Oxford University Press |
| Subjects included | See General information |
| Type of resource | Dictionary |
| Fulltext format | Bibliographic records in HTML |
| Accessibility | Via IP address |
| Login authentication required | No, not on LU-campus. If you are off-campus you will be prompted to login via LU's Central Authentication Service (CAS) with a Student Account or LUCAT-ID. |
| Number of concurrent users | Multiple concurrent access (multiple people reading at the same time) |
| Download required | No |
| Must be borrowed | No |
| Number of days for download | - - |
| Download and read offline | No, but if you create a ‘OED personal profile’ you can send and an entry link for a OED record to a chosen email address. The link allows free access to the entry for three days. |
| Download to a portable device | OED is accessible on mobile devices but is not specifically optimized for those platforms. |
| Copying | No, it is not possible to download copies of entries but you can save them in OED. To be able to save the entries you must first create your own 'My Oxford English Dictionary' profile (free). With your profile, you will be able to save entries and searches, manage folders of saved items, and set your personal preferences. |
| Printing | You may print a single copy of an individual entry, article or other single item of OED for personal use for scholarly purposes, research and educational use. |
| Text to speech | No |
| Export references | Yes |
| Export formats | EndNote, ProCite, ReferenceManager, RefWorks |
| How do I suggest a purchase | We have the full version of Oxford English Dictionary, no further purchases can be made. |
| Restrictions | Walk-in users: Users not affiliated with Lund University may be permitted access to Oxford English Dictionary, but only within the physical premises of Lund University Libraries. Course Packs: Authorized users (registered students and staff) may incorporate single portions of individual chapters in printed or electronic course packs for the use of authorized users for educational purpose. Each course pack must carry acknowledgement of the source. All copies (print and electronic) of the course packs must be deleted when the course ends. Please note that electronic course packs may not in in any way or form be posted on the Internet. Pass on documents: No, students, teachers and researchers may not pass on copies (in print or electronically) of licensed material to other students, teachers and researchers at Lund University, not even for research, private study or otherwise. |
| Interlibrary loan / Fjärrlån | Yes, librarians may supply another publicly funded library in Sweden (but not outside) with a single paper or electronic copy of a document for the purposes of research or private study, but not for commercial use. This can be done by post, fax or electronically. If done electronically the file must be printed out by the recieving library and the electronic file deleted immediately after printing. Please note that by ‘Document’ is meant an individual chapter, an article or other single item, but not a complete ebook. |
| Text and Data Mining (TDM) Policy | OUP recognizes the research benefit of Text and Data Mining (TDM) across a variety of research fields. As such, they are happy to accommodate TDM for non-commercial use. If you have any questions please e-mail Data.Mining@oup.com |
| Miscellaneous | |