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Open Access

This page contains information on publishing in open access journals. Information includes: how to find open access journals, how to know if a journal is open access, where to store and share data openly.

Publishing in Open Access Journals

About Open Access Publishing

Open access publishing eliminates or reduces typical barriers to access of information. When a work is published open access, the public is able to access its content without a subscription. This means that people can access and use open access published works regardless of their location or academic affiliation.

 

Types of Open Access Publishing

  Gold Open Access Green Open Access
Access Final published version freely available online for anyone to access Submitted, accepted manuscript, or final published version can be made freely available online for anyone to access, usually after an embargo or other conditions
Embargoes Freely available immediately Typically there are embargo periods before becoming openly available
Use Typically less strict licensing restrictions which can increase access, dissemination, and re-use Varying licensing options which allows authors more control over the material
Fees Authors, or their institution or funder, pay an Article Processing Charge There is no fee for authors, the subscribers pay to access the material

Hybrid journals are essentially subscription journals, but hybrid journals do give authors open access options for individual articles. These articles typically require the payment of an article processing charge prior to publication in order to publish the article open access.

Farquharson, Jamie (2022): Diamond open access venn diagram [en SVG]. figshare. Figure. https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.21598179.v1. Licensed under CC BY 4.0

Publishing Openly

Use this flowchart to help evaluate if you will be able to publish openly in the journal of your choosing:

A decision tree about choosing an open access journal to publish in. Open Access journal options flowchart Seek a prestigious journal appropriate for your content which reaches its intended audience Is journal Open Access? No: Does journal permit deposit of work in a repository? Yes: Send a copy of the version your publisher allows. Outcome: A version of your work is freely available, subscribers are able to see published article. No: Does journal offer Open Access for a fee? (Hybrid) No: Outcome: Your work is only immediately available to those institutions that can afford to subscribe to this journal. Yes: Do you have the funds or are you eligible for a waiver? No: Choose another journal appropriate for your content which reaches its intended audience. Yes: Outcome: Fantastic! Your published article is freely available from the time of publication. Yes: Does journal charge an article processing fee? No: Outcome: Fantastic! Your published article is freely available from the time of publication. Yes: Do you have the funds or are you eligible for a waiver? No: Choose another journal appropriate for your content which reaches its intended audience. Yes: Outcome: Fantastic! Your published article is freely available from the time of publication. Notes: Check at www.doaj.org Check at www.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo ARC & NHMRC allow authors to use part of their grant to pay for publication fees. Many Open Access journals will waive fees for students or researchers from developing countries. Some journals make articles available after an embargo. Check your institution’s policy relating to intellectual property. ➢ The Accepted Version is the author’s final peer-reviewed and corrected version.

"Open Access journal options flowchart" by Open Access Australasia is licensed under CC BY 4.0

Journal Openess

Open and Closed Access

SPARC in association with PLOS and the Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA) has created this HowOpenIsIt? Open Access Guide to standardize open access terms which makes it easier to understand to what degree journal policies are open or closed:

A chart showing varying degrees of open or closed journal features: Access Spectrum: Open Access to Closed Access Reader Rights Open Access: Free readership rights to all articles immediately upon publication Free readership rights to all articles after an embargo of no more than 6 months Free readership rights to all articles after an embargo greater than 6 months Free and immediate readership rights to some, but not all, articles (including "hybrid" models) Closed Access: Subscription, membership, pay-per-view, or other fees required to read all articles Reuse Rights Open Access: Generous reuse & remixing rights (e.g., CC BY license) Reuse, remixing, & further building upon the work subject to certain restrictions & conditions (e.g., CC BY-NC & CC BY-SA licenses) Reuse (no remixing or further building upon the work) subject to certain restrictions and conditions (e.g., CC BY-ND license) No reuse rights beyond fair use/limitations & exceptions to copyright (all rights reserved copyright) to read Copyrights Open Access: Author holds copyright with no restrictions Author holds copyright, with some restrictions on author reuse of published version Publisher holds copyright, with some allowances for author and reader reuse of published version Publisher holds copyright, with some allowances for author reuse of published version Publisher holds copyright, with no author reuse of published version beyond fair use Author Posting Rights Open Access: Author may post any version to any repository or website Author may post final version of the peer-reviewed manuscript ("postprint") to any repository or website Author may post final version of the peer-reviewed manuscript ("postprint") to certain repositories or websites Author may post submitted version/draft of final work ("preprint") to certain repositories or websites Author may not deposit any versions to repositories or websites Automatic Posting Open Access: Journals make copies of articles automatically available in trusted third-party repositories (e.g., PubMed Central) immediately upon publication Journals make copies of articles automatically available in trusted third-party repositories (e.g., PubMed Central) within 12 months No automatic posting in third-party repositories Machine Readability Open Access: Article full text, metadata, citations, & data, including supplementary data, provided in community machine-readable standard formats through community standard API or protocol Article full text, metadata, citations, & data, including supplementary data, provided in community machine-readable standard formats through a community standard API or protocol Article full text, metadata, & citations freely available and may be accessed without special permission Article full text, metadata, & citations may be crawled or accessed with permission Article full text & metadata available in machine-readable format "HowOpenIsIt?" Open Access spectrum © 2013 SPARC and PLOS, licensed under CC BY.

Publishing Data Openly

Data Repositories and Data Sharing Platforms