The YIVO Library is the world’s only library specializing in the history, languages, literature, culture, folklore, and religious traditions of East European Jewry. It contains nearly 400,000 volumes of books and periodical editions. It has books in many languages, but also constitutes the largest collection of Yiddish-language books, pamphlets, and newspapers in the world.

The volumes in the library range from rare 16th-century imprints to the latest scholarly publications. They document the tumultuous events of Jewish life through the 20th century, including the rise of Zionism and revolutionary socialism, mass emigration, pogroms, the Russian Revolution, the Holocaust, and the continuing development of Jewish life after World War II in Israel and the Diaspora.