Founded in 1896, the library originally had the book collection from Nanyang College, and was renamed Jiaotong University Library in 1921. It covers an area of 40,000 square meters with 3,300 seats inside. There are 3,370,000 books and 80,000 volumes are added annually.
Students can find many kinds of books, including those for science, engineering, information technology, medicine, finance, economics, management, art and law. Moreover, it has many kinds of foreign language books and periodicals, including 15 world famous periodicals. Currently, over 14,000 unique electronic journals are also available.
The library provides a Library Online System, which makes it accessible from every part of the campus, outside campus and worldwide. It also has international cooperation with more than 50 foreign libraries, schools and research institutes. The library is open weekdays 8 am – 9 pm and is always closed on weekends.