WorldCat Discovery release notes, May 2026

Control whether Google Books Preview displays on item details page

You can now turn Google Books Preview on or off for your institution, so you can better align WorldCat Discovery with local policies and preferences.

A new setting within Service Configuration allows you to enable or disable the display of the Google Books Preview button on the item details pages. Previously, this was always shown and could not be turned off. With this update, you have full control over its visibility. It will be enabled by default.

To configure, go to WorldCat Discovery and WorldCat Local > Item Detail Settings > Google Books

Utilize specific indexes like title, author, note, and subject when searching across bibliographic, local holding record (LHR), and local bibliographic data (LBD) for improved accuracy

Index-specific searches (for example, title or author searches) now behave more consistently when you search across collections that include bibliographic records, local bibliographic data, and local holdings records. This helps avoid confusing results that can occur when an index-specific query is treated like a broad keyword search.

Previously, some index-specific searches could match more broadly than expected when searching across these collections, which could return results that did not contain your search term in the requested index field.

• Index-specific searches now return results only when the searched term exists in the requested index field for that record type.
• Local bibliographic data searches now match against local bibliographic data index fields (including cross-collection phrase indexes where applicable), rather than relying on hidden keyword behavior.
• Local holdings record searches now match against local holdings record index fields, rather than relying on hidden keyword behavior.

Series hyperlink search behavior reverted to previous functionality

In the April release, we updated series hyperlink searches on the item details page to use the complete series text exactly as displayed, including series statement and volume number.

We are reverting this change in the May release. Series hyperlink searches will once again use only the series statement when generating the search query, restoring the previous behavior that most users expect and rely on.

MLA citations now use German capitalization rules when the item language is German

MLA citations correctly capitalize German titles when the language of the item is German (MARC 008/35-37 = ger). Previously, German titles would be capitalized using English rules, which could result in incorrect capitalization for articles, conjunctions, and prepositions.

Exporting multiple records to RefWorks now creates separate records

Multiple saved items can now be exported from WorldCat Discovery to RefWorks as separate records. Previously, multiple exported records could be merged into a single record in RefWorks.

Local bibliographic data (MARC 590) now displays on permalinks when enabled

The MARC 590 local bibliographic data field is now visible on the permalink view when local bibliographic data is enabled. Previously, the 590 field could display on the item details page but not on the permalink view for the same record.

Get more accurate results for Chinese character searches

Search more reliably using Chinese characters in WorldCat Discovery, including contributor hyperlink searches, te: index searches, and single-character author searches. Updates to Primary Title (te:) index searching now better support Chinese unigram and bigram matching, helping return more accurate results for exact phrases, partial titles, and names entered without separators. This also improves searches for single-character Chinese surnames. Previously, these searches could return incorrect matches, split characters in unexpected ways, or prevent valid single-character author queries.

Product website

More product information can be found here

WorldCat Discovery events
https://community.oclc.org/t5/worldcat-discovery-events/eb-p/worldcat-discovery-events 

Support website(s)

Support information for this product and related products can be found at:

• WorldCat Discovery documentation
• WorldCat Discovery training resources
• Contact OCLC Support
• OCLC Community Center
• Browser compatibility chart

Include Request ID with problem reports

When reporting an issue with WorldCat Discovery, it is extremely helpful to include the Request ID. The Request ID is found at the bottom of the screen on which the issue occurred. Including this information allows us to directly trace what happened on the request we are troubleshooting.