The brother of Joseph Reinach, he was born at St Germain-en-Laye and educated at the École normale supérieure before joining the French school at Athens in 1879. He made valuable archaeological discoveries at Myrina near Smyrna in 1880-82, at Cyme in 1881, at Thasos, Imbros and Lesbos (1882), at Carthage and Meninx (1883-84), at Odessa (1893) and elsewhere. He received honours from the chief learned societies of Europe.
In 1886 he obtained an appointment at the National Museum of Antiquities at St Germain; in 1893 he became assistant keeper, and in 1902 keeper of the national museums. In 1903 he became joint editor of the Revue archéologique, and in the same year officer of the Legion of Honour. The lectures he delivered on art at the École du Louvre in 1902-3 were published by him under the title of Apollo. These were translated into most European languages, and became a standard handbook on the subject.
Reinach's first published work was a translation of Arthur Schopenhauer's Essay on Free Will (1877), which passed through many editions. This was followed by many works and articles in the learned reviews of which a list--up to 1903--is available in Bibliographie de S. R. (Angers, 1903). His Manuel de philologie classique (1880-1884) was crowned by the French association for the study of Greek; his Grammaire latine (1886) received a prize from the Society of Secondary Education; La Nécropole de Myrina (1887), written with E Pottier, and Antiquités nationales were crowned by the Academy of Inscriptions. He compiled an important Repertoire de la statuaire grécque et romaine (3 vols., 1897-98); also Repertoire de peintures du moyen âge et de la Renaissance 1280-1580 (1905, etc.); Repertoire des vases points grecs et etrusques (1900). In 1905 he began his Cultes, mythes et religions; and in 1909 he published a general sketch of the history of religions under the title of Orpheus. He also translated from the English HC Lea's History of the Inquisition.
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