How to make your work Open Access

All original research articles can and should be made Open Access, there is more than one route to do this. To be eligible for submission to the REF, all journal articles and conference proceedings must be Open Access. Most research funders also require outputs to be available Open Access too (see our Open Access policies page for more detail on this).

Here is a step by step guide to making your work Open Access (click on each step to see actions required). Please work through this before you submit to a journal. We can now only accept requests for Gold Open Access funding before submission to the journal.

We encourage authors who have been recommended by a publisher to re-submit to another of that publisher’s journals to double check if said journal is fully open access or not.

You can also use our open access workflow diagram to guide you.

Step 1: Choose a journal

Before you submit to this journal follow through the next steps to determine the OA route that is available to you.

Step 2: Click here to check whether the corresponding author is eligible for funding

Corresponding author is an XJTLU staff member or student - XJTLU staff are not eligible for funding. Please submit to your chosen journal via the subscription route (or seek alternative funding if it is a fully gold journal). Deposit Accepted Manuscript in Elements upon acceptance to make your work Open Access in the University Repository.

Corresponding author is a researcher at the University of Liverpool (staff member or PGR student), or the grant is held here, go to Step 3.

Step 3: Is this journal available to the corresponding author in our list of prepaid deals?

Yes - Submit to your chosen journal and follow publisher instructions to choose Open Access publication. If presented with a choice of licence, you must choose the CC-BY licence - we cannot approve more restrictive licences, such as CC-BY-NC. For more guidance on Creative Commons Licenses, check out our Creative Commons Licenses Guide.

No - go to Step 4

Step 4: Is the journal in the Directory of Open Access Journals?

Yes - Fill in the Gold Open Access Payment Request form. Receive confirmation from the Open Research Team that funds are available and then submit to your chosen journal. If presented with a choice of licence, you must choose the CC-BY licence - we cannot approve more restrictive licences, such as CC-BY-NC.

If you want to submit to a fully open access journal not listed in DOAJ, please email the Open Access Team and we'll look into it.

Please note, honorary staff are not eligible unless the grant is held here.

No - Go to Step 5.

Step 5: Submit via the subscription / repository route (free)

Step 5 Submit to your chosen journal via the subscription route. Deposit the Accepted Manuscript in Elements upon acceptance to make your work Open Access in the University Repository.

UKRI (Research Councils) and Wellcome Trust require their grantees to use a specific wording in submissions to subscription journals to ensure they (the grantees) retain the rights to make their Author Accepted Manuscript available. Further details, and the text of these statements, are available on our Open Access Policies page.

These steps apply to:

  • Original research journal articles
  • Non-commissioned review articles
  • Conference proceedings

We cannot fund:

  • Data articles
  • Protocols
  • Editorial material
  • Invited reviews
  • Book reviews
  • Commentaries

These articles should be made Open Access by depositing the Accepted Manuscript in Elements.

If you are unsure which route to take in order to make your output Open Access please contact the Open Research Team.