The Ottoman Bank (Bank-ı Osmani-i Şahane) was founded in 1863 and the Ottoman Bank Building in Karaköy opened for service in 1892 as the result of reconstruction and the opening of the Bank to a market policy. The building was the head office of The Ottoman Bank until 1999. Today, the building hosts the Karaköy Branch of Garanti Bank and its Area Directorates on the ground floor. The Ottoman Bank Archives and Research Center is on the upper floors of the building.

In addition to the history of the institution, the objects and documents displayed in the museum aim to provide a series of insights into the late Ottoman and early Republican period. The museum offers a combination of both chronological and thematic approaches and displays the social, economic and political environment of the times through bank branches, customer files, market operations and personnel files.

Four bank vaults are located at the center of the main exhibit hall and they are used to display a number of archival series: accounting books, stocks and bonds, customer files, deposit cards, personnel files and photographs. The fourth and the largest two-storied vault hosts the silver coins and banknotes issued between 1863 and 1914 together with the story, design, registration and samples of each. Tahsin İsbiroğlu's unique banknote collection is also on display in this fourth vault.

The Ottoman Bank Museum not only quotes the story of a corporation but also enables an awareness of a social history with its design and content.