All the publications and other library materials acquired are processed in conformity with international rules, and all the data are recorded in appropriate catalogues. From the very start, the University Library has had a public author catalogue and an internal topographic catalogue wherein the cards were sorted according to the signature numbers, which determine the place of an item in stock. After the Second World War the establishment of a systematic catalogue was carried out in accordance with the structure of faculties and faculty departments of Belgrade University.
In the card author catalogue, cards containing the bibliographic record of each item are sorted alphabetically, according to the authors’ surnames, or based on the title, in the case of works by anonymous authors or those with more than three authors. In the systematic catalogue, the cards are sorted according to the scientific disciplines they belong to, and within those according to the alphabetical order of entries. There exist the following card and electronic catalogues in the library:
the author catalogue of books and Ph.D. theses, divided into three parts, according to the alphabet and the year of publication: Cyrillic and Latin alphabet catalogues for works published before 1963, and a joint catalogue with Latin alphabet entries for issues published after the year 1963;
the systematic catalogue of books and the systematic catalogue of Ph.D. theses are arranged according to the classification system produced by the University Library itself, and are based on the structure of Belgrade University. The systematic catalogue also contains a subject register;
the title and systematic catalogue of serial publications, wherein entries are sorted according to the title or according to the UDC scheme;
the alphabetical and chronological catalogues of old and rare books, according to the entries and in chronological order (situated in the Department of Old and Rare Books);
the catalogue of illustrations in old books and serials (situated in the Department of Old and Rare Books);
the catalogue of archive documents (situated in the Department for Old and Rare Books);
the catalogue of pseudonyms (situated in the Department of Cataloguing) and
the catalogue of the Vojislav M. Jovanovic-Marambo library (situated in the Department of Folk Literature);
the union catalogue of the University of Belgrade (started in 1930), situated in the Department of Academic Network and Development
and
the electronic catalogue, which includes all the publications which have entered the University Library collection after 1988, when the Library started participating in the establishment of a common catalogue for national and university libraries of the former Yugoslavia. It was produced according to the standards for online accessible catalogues, includes UDC and subject headings, and is searchable based on 30 different criteria. The electronic catalogue is accessible via the Internet 24 hours a day.