The Digital Imperative
Why Museums Must Build for Access, Resilience, and Relevance
Executive Summary
Museums today are navigating a pivotal moment. While the most urgent disruptions of the pandemic have passed, its ripple effects remain deeply felt. Audiences have changed. Funding landscapes have shifted. Community expectations around access, inclusion, and participation are evolving—quickly.
At the same time, many museums are still expected to do more with less. Staff capacity is stretched. Digital infrastructure is uneven. And expectations—from visitors, boards, funders, and the public—continue to rise.
This whitepaper offers a grounded, optimistic look at what digital transformation means for museums today. It is not a call to become tech companies. It’s not about innovation for its own sake. Rather, it’s a roadmap for how digital tools—when thoughtfully applied—can help museums do what they’ve always done: steward stories, foster connection, and serve their communities.
Drawing on the latest research from the American Alliance of Museums and other field-wide reports, this piece explores how institutions can:
Expand accessibility and reach diverse audiences with layered, multilingual, and self-guided experiences
Build resilience by preserving digital content sustainably and intentionally
Create deeper engagement by personalizing interpretation to meet the needs of visitors with varied interests and backgrounds
Use data to make informed decisions about programming, storytelling, and community impact
From a visitor seeking a short overview to a specialist wanting technical depth, museums today must serve a wide range of needs—all within the same experience. This is not only possible, but increasingly expected. Digital tools—especially those designed for mobile access—offer museums the space and flexibility to enrich interpretation in ways that signage and labels alone simply can’t.
This is a moment of opportunity. With the right approach, digital engagement can be an extension of mission—not a departure from it.
The State of Museums in 2025
The museum sector has long been defined by resilience. In the years following the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, museums have reopened their doors, rebuilt community programs, and returned to public life. But full recovery—both in attendance and infrastructure—remains uneven.
According to the American Alliance of Museums’ 2024 Snapshot, only 51% of U.S. museums have regained pre-pandemic attendance levels [1]. While some institutions have seen record-breaking visitation thanks to blockbuster exhibits or local tourism rebounds, others—particularly small to midsize museums—are still operating at reduced capacity or facing budgetary constraints.
Meanwhile, the workforce pipeline remains strained. Over half of museums report difficulties hiring for essential roles, including visitor services, volunteers, and front-of-house staff [1]. This staffing friction compounds operational challenges and places more pressure on existing teams to stretch across programming, engagement, and administrative duties.
Yet the most significant shift is not logistical—it’s cultural. Audiences now expect museums to be more than repositories of knowledge. They expect accessibility, representation, and interactive, responsive experiences that meet them where they are. In response, many institutions are rethinking how they define participation, education, and storytelling in the 21st century.
This period of recalibration presents a rare opportunity. The crisis of the last few years forced institutions to experiment with digital tools, virtual programs, and new forms of outreach. Now, with breathing room to reflect and strategize, museums can design digital engagement not as a reaction, but as a long-term investment in access, resilience, and mission.
Engagement Is Fragmented
Visitors don’t arrive at a museum with a single mindset—and they never have. One guest may be an aerospace engineer looking for technical specs on a jet turbine. Another might be a high school student curious about the human story behind a piece of art. A Gen Z visitor might want a more self-guided, exploratory experience rooted in storytelling and media. A casual tourist might simply be looking to understand why something matters.
Today’s museum audiences are more diverse than ever: generationally, linguistically, culturally, and experientially. Designing a single interpretive approach that satisfies all of them—on the wall, in limited space—is not just difficult, it’s impossible.
This is where thoughtful use of digital content can shine. When paired with a well-considered physical experience, mobile tools can offer museums layered interpretation—giving visitors options to explore more (or less) based on their interests and knowledge level. Instead of a single label trying to speak to everyone, museums can offer parallel paths: curatorial insight, audio reflection, community voice, or multilingual access—all without disrupting the exhibit’s physical integrity.
Of course, many institutions are right to be cautious. Some worry that digital layers could become distractions—that visitors might disengage from the real artifact in favor of screens. But this isn’t about turning museums into media environments. It’s about giving museums the flexibility to serve different audiences on their own terms—and without cluttering the space or overburdening staff.
Digital interpretation doesn’t have to replace anything. It can simply create more room—for more stories, more context, and more ways in.
Dive deeper into this topic here: Why One-Size-Fits-All Interpretation Doesn’t Work Anymore
Accessibility & Inclusion Are Mission-Critical
Visitors enter museums with different lived experiences, languages, and expectations—and that diversity is a strength. But it also poses a challenge: how can a single exhibit label or docent tour speak to everyone?
Some visitors need content in another language. Others benefit from slower pacing or visual reinforcement. A few may seek deeper curatorial context, while others prefer concise takeaways. Some have sensory or mobility needs that influence how they move through the space.
The truth is: accessibility and inclusion aren’t side missions. They’re central to the museum experience. And as public institutions, museums are increasingly expected to create environments where more people feel welcome, seen, and supported—not as a regulatory requirement, but as an extension of their purpose.
Digital tools offer a powerful solution. Without requiring more square footage or signage, mobile interpretation allows museums to:
Offer content in multiple languages without cluttering walls
Provide optional audio for guests who benefit from listening rather than reading
Surface community or artist perspectives alongside traditional labels
Create alternative pacing for visitors with sensory or cognitive considerations
Importantly, this doesn’t mean turning every exhibit into a tech experience. It simply means using digital interpretation as a flexible layer—available when a visitor wants more, but never in the way when they don’t.
For curators, this also unlocks new freedom. Digital platforms give museums unlimited storytelling space—room to offer deeper narratives, behind-the-scenes context, or multiple viewpoints that wouldn’t fit on a traditional label. With mobile interpretation, museums can better meet the needs of everyone in the room—not just the average.
Dive deeper into this topic here: Designing for Everyone: Access and Inclusion in Museum Interpretation
Museums Need Data to Lead
Mission-driven institutions often operate on instinct. Curators, educators, and directors develop programs based on expertise, field knowledge, and the needs they observe in their communities. But as audience expectations evolve—and as funding becomes more competitive—there’s growing pressure to move beyond anecdotal feedback and start measuring engagement in concrete ways.
Today, funders, boards, and city partners increasingly ask:
Who are you reaching?
What’s resonating?
How do you know?
These aren’t just bureaucratic questions. They’re strategic ones. Understanding how visitors interact with content—what they explore, where they linger, which stories connect—can help museums improve interpretation, refine programming, and better fulfill their mission.
And yet, most museums still lack the tools to answer those questions clearly. Visitor feedback is often informal or inconsistent. Surveys provide snapshots, but not patterns. In physical galleries, it’s difficult to know what draws a visitor in or how long they engage with an exhibit. And in many digital contexts, there’s no data at all.
This is where thoughtfully designed analytics can help. Not surveillance—just signals. Aggregated, privacy-respecting insights can show museums where engagement is high or low, which interpretation tools are used, or how multilingual access affects time-on-content. These metrics can strengthen grant applications, support curatorial decisions, and surface new community needs.
Ultimately, data isn’t about proving success—it’s about improving service. It helps museums focus limited resources where they’ll have the most impact. And in a sector that’s stretched thin, that clarity can be transformative.
Dive deeper into this topic here: Why Museums Need Data (And What to Do With It)
Digital Preservation & Resilience
Museums have made enormous strides in digitizing their collections, exhibition content, and interpretive materials—especially over the past five years. But digitization alone is not the goal. The real challenge lies in ensuring that digital content remains accessible, relevant, and useful over time.
Too often, digital projects are launched with urgency and creativity—only to be stranded later due to staff turnover, funding shifts, or changing platforms. Broken links, deprecated file formats, and lost context can quietly erode even the most ambitious digital efforts. As a result, years of curatorial work risk disappearing into outdated systems or forgotten archives.
This isn’t a failure of intent. It’s a failure of infrastructure. Museums are experts in physical stewardship, but digital resilience requires a different mindset. It means thinking of digital content not as a marketing asset or a short-term engagement tool, but as part of the institution’s long-term memory—deserving the same care and continuity as physical collections.
This shift doesn’t require a tech overhaul. In fact, the most sustainable solutions are often the simplest. Museums need digital tools that are easy to update, stable across time, and designed with non-technical staff in mind. They need platforms that don’t rely on a single developer or grant cycle to survive. And most importantly, they need the freedom to tell stories on their own terms—without being boxed in by templates or tech trends.
A sustainable digital strategy supports content that lasts—not because it’s trendy, but because it’s meaningful. And in an era where trust, transparency, and accessibility matter more than ever, preserving those stories is mission-critical.
Dive deeper into this topic here: Avoiding Digital Decay: A Strategy for Sustainable Museum Content
Narrative Futures
Museums have long been trusted as sources of knowledge. But in recent years, there’s been a shift in what visitors expect from that knowledge—not just accuracy, but perspective. People increasingly want to know: Whose voice is speaking? What other stories exist alongside this one? Where do I fit in?
This doesn’t mean abandoning expertise. It means expanding it. Today’s most impactful museums are moving beyond single-author narratives to embrace layered storytelling—curatorial insight, artist perspective, community voice, and guest reflection all coexisting. These institutions aren’t just presenting history or culture. They’re inviting interpretation, participation, and conversation.
Younger audiences especially—like Gen Z and digital-native millennials—gravitate toward content that feels personal, immersive, and inclusive. They value transparency and are more likely to engage when they see themselves reflected in the story. They’re also used to navigating complex media: clicking deeper, switching between text and audio, toggling between viewpoints.
Traditional wall labels, no matter how well written, can only carry so much. And static interpretation doesn’t scale easily. Once printed and mounted, a label can’t evolve with the conversation. That’s where digital interpretation becomes a powerful tool—not to replace the gallery, but to expand it.
With digital platforms, museums can:
Offer behind-the-scenes insight into an artist’s process
Share first-person audio from community partners or living contributors
Add new content over time without reprinting or reframing an exhibit
Let visitors choose how deeply they explore—and from what angle
Storytelling has always been at the heart of museum work. What’s changing is how many stories a single space can hold—and how many people get to help tell them.
Dive deeper into this topic here: Letting Go of the Single Story: A New Era of Museum Interpretation
Building Forward, Not Backward
The museum sector has always evolved. From collection care to community programming, interpretation to education, museums have adapted to new technologies, audience expectations, and cultural shifts—not by chasing trends, but by staying grounded in their mission.
Today’s challenges are real: unpredictable attendance, complex visitor needs, strained staff capacity, and the pressure to do more with less. But they are not insurmountable. In fact, they present an opportunity—an invitation to rethink how museums share knowledge, preserve stories, and invite connection.
What’s clear is that digital strategy is no longer optional. It’s essential. Not in the sense of flashy apps or speculative tech—but as a way to build accessibility, resilience, and relevance into everything museums already do. When used thoughtfully, digital tools can make exhibits more inclusive. Interpretation more dynamic. Operations more sustainable.
That’s why Footnote was created. It’s a mobile platform designed specifically for museums—built to help institutions deepen visitor engagement, expand access, and preserve interpretive content over time. With features like curatorial storytelling, multilingual support, immersive audio, and built-in analytics, Footnote helps museums share layered narratives with diverse audiences—on their own terms, and at their own pace. See how Footnote can support this strategy within your institution on our Features page or book a demo.
There’s no one-size-fits-all approach. But there is a way forward that respects the values of the field while embracing the tools of the future. With clarity, care, and the right support, museums can not only meet this moment—but shape what comes next.
[1] American Alliance of Museums. (2024). 2024 Museum Snapshot Report.