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Apply for museum accreditation

Apply for Museum Accreditation

The Accreditation Scheme is the UK industry standard for museums and galleries.

It helps everyone involved with a museum to do the right things, helping people to access and engage with collections, and protect them for future generations.

The Accreditation Scheme does this by making sure museums manage their collections properly, engage with visitors, and are governed appropriately by encouraging all museums and galleries to meet an agreed standard in:

  • how they’re run
  • how they manage their collections
  • how they engage with their users

Completing your Return

Completing your return 

If you have been invited to submit your Accreditation Return, you may find it useful to read through our advice and guidance on Accreditation Returns, which includes information about what to include in your submission, help with using Grantium, and links to other useful resources to support you as you prepare your submission. 

Find out more about the Return schedule 2024 and beyond

A performer is stood in front of an audience. The audience are sat on chairs. They are all in a library. The performer is playing an Accordion and wearing a deerstalker hat. Behind the performer is a small set green cloth and toadstools.
Photo by The Nosy Little Troll by Garlic Theatre at Mile Cross Library. Image credit Charlie Plumb
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he Return Schedule – find out when to submit your return.

The Return Schedule – find out when to submit your return. 

An award of Full Accreditation is valid for approximately five years, at which point we would usually invite your museum to provide a return to demonstrate continuing compliance with the Accreditation Standard.  

Since the pause of the scheme in 2020-2021 in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, we have been taking a phased approach to re-opening the Accreditation scheme in England. This means that some museums will have had their Accreditation award extended for longer than five years.  

Last year we published an interim schedule which covered our expected rollout until December 2023, and in June 2023 we published an update about what to expect for the Return schedule from 2024-25 onwards.  

We are pleased to be able to share the return schedule for those fully Accredited Museums which are due to submit in the first portion of 2024. 

Covid-19 update

The UK Accreditation Partnership

The UK Accreditation Partnership

We want all museums to be sustainable, focused and trusted organisations, which offer their visitors a great experience. The Accreditation Scheme sets out nationally-agreed standards, which inspire the confidence of the public and funding and governing bodies.

The scheme is managed as a UK Partnership between Arts Council England, the Welsh Government, Museums Galleries Scotland and Northern Ireland Museums Council. It is run for museums and galleries of all sizes and types across the UK. 

The online application portal is hosted and managed by Arts Council England on behalf of the UK Accreditation Partners.

Get started

Get started

Whether you’re applying to Accreditation for the first time or making a regular return application you’ll need to use our application portal, Grantium. This is for all Accredited museums and galleries across the United Kingdom. You’ll also use this if you are already confirmed as eligible as Working Towards Accreditation and about to make your first application.

Image of mummy's sarcophagus
Photo by Ancient Worlds at Manchester Museum. Image © Manchester Museum
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Colchester & Ipswich Museum Service, young people on tablets.
Photo by Colchester & Ipswich Museum Service. Photo (c) Seana Hughes
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Help using Grantium

Help using Grantium

Before you can start your online submission, you need to create a user account and an applicant profile, if you don’t have one already.

You can’t start an application until we’ve validated your applicant profile, which may take up to 10 working days. Once you’ve had notification your applicant profile is validated you’ll be able to apply using the online portal.

Ready to start your online submission on Grantium? You’ll find it helpful to read our step by step guidance for the online system as it’s tailored for Accreditation. This includes frequently asked questions.

Recently Accredited?

Recently Accredited?

Your museum and its collections are the best advertisement for Accreditation there is. We’ve created a template press release, social media toolkit and some logo and branding guidelines to help you share the good news about your recent Accreditation.

Already Accredited

Already Accredited?

Support is available to museums that are already members of the scheme, to help them maintain the national standard.

Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford
Photo by Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford
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Accreditation Guidance review

Accreditation Guidance review

The Accreditation Guidance will be reviewed and refreshed from Spring 2023-2024 with a new version due to be published in mid-2024. 

The aim is to make the guidance clearer, more accessible and relevant to the current needs of museums. Overall, we are aiming to create an update that is straightforward for applicants and assessors to use, with clear read-across between the standard, guidance and application form. 

There will be some limited and targeted consultation during the review and refresh process which will be overseen by the UK Accreditation Partners.

Any participants or new applicants who are preparing an Accreditation submission using the current guidance should carry on. The refreshed guidance won’t be ready until 2024 and we will build in some flex while the new version of the guidance beds in.  

The current Accreditation Standard (2018), which is the industry standard for UK museums, has no plans at this time to review it. 

Contact us

An image showing two people wearing masks and hanging a painting on a white gallery wall. The painting is of a small yellow airplane by a lake, in front of a colourful sunset sky.

Contact us

All UK museums and galleries applying to or in the Scheme can access technical support on using Grantium from our Customer Services team. We’re available by email 10am-5pm, Monday to Friday.