Archaeological researchers in many European countries lack state-of-the-art digital repositories where they can deposit their data for long-term preservation and make it available to the research community. The paper suggests building and mandating deposition of the data in a national-level repository as an effective solution. It enables clear orientation of all national stakeholders, formation of a trusted centre of expertise, guidance and support, cost-effectiveness of data curation and access, and aggregation at the European level by the ARIADNE data infrastructure.