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This page provides details of UKRI’s open access policy for long-form publications, including open access options, access to funding and policy exceptions.
UKRI open policy for long-form publications
From 2024, UKRI-funded long-form publications must be made open access no later than 12 months after publication under CC BY or another Creative Commons licence. The requirement does not apply to outputs that are published before 1 January 2024. Funding for open access fees is available to UKRI-funded researchers. Authors of book chapters, and editors, must inform their collaborators about UKRI's open access requirements.
What publications are included?
UKRI's open access policy applies to monographs, book chapters and edited collections that acknowledge funding from UKRI or any of its councils, and are published on or after 1 January 2024. It does not apply to:
- Trade books, unless they are the only output from UKRI-funded research.
- Scholarly editions.
- Exhibition catalogues.
- Scholarly illustrated catalogues.
- Textbooks.
- All types of fictional works and creative writing.
- Outputs published seven or more years after the formal end of a UKRI-funded project.
What open access options are available?
UKRI advice is to inform your preferred publisher of your UKRI funding when you first submit your proposal, and check if they offer a compliant open access publishing option - before entering into any contractual agreement. Typical options are:
- Gold open access: many publishers offer to apply open access to the final published version upon publication, usually in exchange for a fee paid by the author. A Creative Commons licence is typically applied. See our UKRI funding page for information on accessing Gold open access funding.
- UCL Press: fully open access and compliant with the UKRI policy. The UCL Press website provides information about submitting your proposal.
- Diamond open access: some open access publishers do not charge fees to either authors or readers. Open Book Publishers is an example of this model.
- Green open access: publishers may permit authors to upload their accepted manuscript version to RPS, to be made open access through UCL's open access repository at no cost. Make sure your manuscript is clearly marked as the final accepted version, and include the relevant Creative Commons licence attribution. Upload your manuscript within 12 months of first publication date, and alert the UCL Open Access Team after uploading.
Support and guidance
Contact UCL's Open Access Team if you have questions about the policy or would like advice on discussing options with your publisher.
Links to UKRI guidance
- Making your monograph, book chapter or edited collection open access - a guide for UKRI-funded authors.
- For definitions of long-form publication types, see 'Policy scope and compliance routes: additional definitions' in Annex 1 of the policy.
- Managing third-party copyright for research publications: a good practice guide for researchers publishing open access monographs and book chapters.
- Guidance on using exceptions is available in Annex 3 of the UKRI policy.
- UKRI's FAQs on open access and long-form publications.