Welcome
We're open Tuesday-Sunday, 12-5 pm
Groups need to book in advance
We're open Tuesday-Sunday, 12-5 pm
Groups need to book in advance
GALLERY CLOSURE: our Top Gallery is currently closed while we carry out essential maintenance work. Our Middle and Basement Galleries are open with histories and stories to share with you.
LIFT OUT OF ACTION: apologies, we cannot offer disabled, level access to the Museum.
Situated in the heart of Oxford, our beautiful home is the oldest public museum building in the world.
We are on a transformational journey to preserve our building’s heritage and safeguard its future.
Our Vision24 project is all about making your Museum fully accessible and inclusive, so everyone can enjoy it for generations to come.
To save lives during the COVID-19 pandemic, scientists took innovative approaches to produce rigorously tested, clinical-grade vaccines and drugs at speed.
But how can these new techniques deliver wider healthcare benefits for all of us?
A Healthy Future for All? empowers you to discover the science for yourself, and explore some of the big questions around the future of healthcare.
Guglielmo Marconi (1874-1937) had a simple vision: to connect the world through wireless technology.
Much of the technology we use today — mobile phones, wifi, GPS, and Bluetooth — can trace its origins back to Marconi’s ideas and devices.
Explore how Marconi’s hands-on science experiments revolutionised how the world stays connected.
In the Museum that inspired Lyra's alethiometer ...
Just like Lyra with her alethiometer, we search for answers to life's questions in our moving universe. Journey to our Basement and step into the world of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials. Discover iconic costumes and devices from the BBC series, explore intriguing dials that inspired Philip Pullman to create Lyra's alethiometer, and send your questions out to the cosmos.
Our objects and archives at your fingertips in one, easy-to-use search dashboard.
Andrew Robinson, author of Einstein in Oxford (Bodleian, 2024), explores the story behind Einstein's blackboard and the enduring appeal of one of the world's most famous scientists.
Find out about the Babbage Archive project. Enabled by support from the Clay Mathematics Institute and a UKRI grant, the Museum is conserving and digitising a precious archive of Babbage material.
MultakaOxford volunteer Valerii Malko, a philosophy professor from Ukraine, shares his research into the history of public health and sewage systems in Oxford.
From powerful Sultans to a French countess, Dr Sumner Braund tracks down the owners of a rare Mesopotamian astrolabe, exploring the marks they left — and the price they paid.
We are guardians of the world's most comprehensive collection of astronomical instruments from the Islamic World.
Explore our fascinatingly rich and diverse collection, including A History of the Islamic World in 11 Maps.
Join our experts as they put a selection of our working scientific instruments through their paces. It's rare we have a chance to handle these objects, so we hope you enjoy seeing them come to life as much as we did.
MultakaOxford brings the rich, diverse knowledge of people settling in Oxford — many through forced migration — to the History of Science Museum and Pitt Rivers Museum.
My Place, My Science supports young people of African and black Caribbean heritage to enjoy science and build cultural connections.
Portrait artist & photographer Fran Monks talked with our colleague Izzy Treyvaud to explore how photography can celebrate the extraordinary stories of 'ordinary' people.
Take a look back at the stunning exhibition of islamic metalwork from The Courtauld.
Collecting COVID curator Tina Eyre shares her experiences of working with the Bodleian Libraries to build a 'living history' collection from Oxford University's pandemic response.
Discover the story of Waldemar Haffkine, the "vaccine pioneer the world forgot", and his 35-year friendship with groundbreaking photographer Sarah Acland.
Join Helen and Mathilde on Zoom to explore the Zodiac through some amazing Museum objects.
Discover a fascinating journey of scientific, artistic and cultural influence across 1400 years and four continents.
A big thank you to all our volunteers who make our Museum welcoming, interesting and open to all.
Would you like to join them?
Thanks to your generosity, we can keep highlighting ingenious stories that spark curiosity for as many people as possible.
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