Controlled digital lending in UK higher education: a landscape review
31 October 2025 
Jo Lambert, Deputy Director
Controlled digital lending in UK higher education: a landscape review, written by Jane Secker and Chris Morrison, offers a follow-up to the briefing paper published by Jisc, SCONUL and RLUK in 2024 Controlled digital lending (CDL) in UK higher education: a Jisc briefing for libraries.
Controlled digital lending can support access to content not otherwise available in digital format, enabling libraries to provide accessible and inclusive readings to students, provide remote access to special collections or to supply out of commerce works.
Published in September 2025 and now available to members via the SCONUL website, the latest report builds on earlier work to assess the current state of controlled digital lending (CDL) in UK academic libraries. Data gathered in spring 2025 through a national survey of 58 institutions, interviews with seven institutions, one vendor and a consortium solution provider underpin the report. It considers the status of CDL implementation in academic libraries, the use cases driving adoption, technical requirements for implementation and currently available solutions. The report also considers the benefits, costs, barriers and legal implications of CDL, whilst concluding with some practical recommendations for institutions and library leaders as well as for Jisc, SCONUL, RLUK and other sector-level bodies.
SCONUL members can access the report here