How to Use Your Free Reads with a Personal Account

How to start reading for free

With a free personal JSTOR account, you can read up to 100 articles online for free every 30 days.

To get started:

1. Create a personal account or sign in to your existing personal account.
2. Search for articles on JSTOR. Your results will default to content that you can access.
3. When you find an article you'd like to read, choose the Alternate access options button, then select the Read Online option.
   • Only eligible articles will include this option.
4. Once you've chosen Read Online, you'll see a banner at the top of the page that tells you how many free article reads you have remaining for the period. You'll have 30 days to read this article for free.
5. Scroll to start reading, or use the pagination controls at the top of the PDF viewing window.

Your JSTOR account can also help you organize your research. See Organizing your research with Workspace for more information.

Where to find articles you've read

If you previously read an article that you'd like to reference or read again, you can find a record of the articles you have read under the Free Article Views section of your JSTOR account drop-down menu.

To see your articles:

1. Sign in to your personal account.
2. Hover or choose your name in the top-right corner of the page, and select Free Article Views from the drop-down menu.
3. You can also click Free Article Views on the left side of the page when viewing your profile.

On your Free Article Views page, you can see how long it will be until your article reads reset. From the time you choose Read Online for the first time to read an article, you'll have 30 days to use any remaining articles before the article count resets, and you can proceed to read new free articles.

For example, if you read your first article on April 15th, your 30-day period begins and lasts until the available article count will reset on May 15th of the same year. If you read another article within the same time period, for example on April 30th, the reset has not yet occurred. Your available article count would still reset on May 15th, and you have until then to read your remaining articles.

What happens when the countdown ends? / How can I remove articles?

While it's not possible to remove items from your Free Article Views page until after your article count resets, you can read available articles for free when a new article count cycle begins.

Return to your research at any time. When the 30-day article count cycle has ended, all articles that you've read online will move to the Previously-viewed articles section of your Free Article Views page so you won't lose your research. If you want to read the same article again in a different 30-day cycle, you can select that article to read, but please note this counts as an article view for the current month's count as well.