Handbooks for the Identification of British Insects is a series of books produced by the Royal Entomological Society (RES). The aim of the Handbooks is to provide illustrated identification keys to the insects of Britain, together with concise morphological, biological and distributional information. The series also includes several Check Lists of British Insects. All books contain line drawings, with the most recent volumes including colour photographs. In recent years, new volumes in the series have been published by Field Studies Council, and benefit from association with the AIDGAP identification guides and Synopses of the British Fauna.

Analogous publications exist in other countries. An equivalent identification key, Klucze do oznaczania owadów Polski (‘Keys for the identification of Polish insects’), exists in Poland.^[1] In France a multivolume series, Faune de France (‘Fauna of France’), covers the insects among other animal groups.^[2]