The People's Republic of China is a country with a rich history of archives and libraries that can be traced back more than 2000 years. National libraries were created in the 19th century, and their task is to collect and preserve all material related to a particular country. The National Library of China (NLC) is the national library of the People's Republic of China located in Beijing. The predecessor of the National Library of China was the Metropolitan Library, founded in 1909 with the approval of the Qing Dynasty. The NLC collection contains more than 37 million volumes (as of December 2017), and this number grows by almost a million every year. The total collection of the National Library of China ranks seventh among national libraries in the world. The library consists of four components: the northern part of the library, the southern part of the library, the library of ancient books and the children's library. In addition, NLC has established the largest digital resource repository and service base in the People's Republic of China. It is responsible for providing services to national legislative decision-making bodies, research, educational and manufacturing institutions, the library community, and the public. The aim of this paper is to present the historical development and contemporary tasks of the Chinese National Library.