Which scientific society published Newton's Principia in 1687?

The Royal Society published Newton’s Principia in 1687.

The society was central to the book’s publication: its president, Samuel Pepys, granted the imprimatur that authorized the work for printing. The first book was presented to the Royal Society in 1686, and the complete three-volume work appeared in 1687 under the title Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica.

There is an important financial wrinkle. The Royal Society had already spent much of its book budget on De Historia Piscium, a lavish work about fish. As a result, Edmond Halley personally paid the printing costs and helped manage publication. The society nevertheless remained the institutional body that approved and issued the landmark work.

The Principia was written in Latin and introduced Newton’s three laws of motion alongside his law of universal gravitation. It was not published by the later Royal Institution, founded in 1799, nor by the French Academy of Sciences. The Royal Society’s involvement also reflects its broader seventeenth-century role in promoting experimental and mathematical science.