UK Research and Innovation (UKRI)
As of 1 April 2022, UKRI’s new Open Access Policy applies to all peer-reviewed research papers submitted on or after that date.
UK Research & Innovation brings together Research England, Innovate UK, and the seven Research Councils:
- Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC)
- Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC)
- Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)
- Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC)
- Medical Research Council (MRC)
- Natural Environment Research Council (NERC)
- Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC)
UKRI’s updated Open Access policy applies to all peer-reviewed, original research articles, supported wholly or in part, by UKRI, that were submitted on or after 1 April 2022. Grant holders should familiarise themselves with the requirements of the revised Open Access Policy on UKRI’s webpages.
UKRI’s Open Access policy will also apply to long form publications: monographs, book chapters, and edited volumes, published on or after 1 January 2024. Until that date, publishing costs should be included in research grants, so cannot be covered by the UKRI block grant.
For articles submitted from 1 April 2022
All original peer-reviewed research articles (including reviews and commissioned reviews) must be made freely available by the final publication date with a Creative Commons Attribution Licence (CC BY).
Articles acknowledging funding from one or more of UKRI’s research council must include the following statement at the point the article is submitted:
“For the purpose of open access, the author has applied a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence to any Author Accepted Manuscript version arising.”
Publications that are not required to publish Open Access include: data articles and articles describing a method or protocol.
To apply to have your Article Processing Charges covered by King’s block grant, you must fill out a Funding Request Form prior to, or on acceptance, of your paper. Once the form has been filled out the Library Open Access team will evaluate whether your article is eligible under UKRI’s terms and conditions.
Must do’s:
There are several requirements that authors must follow:
- Acknowledge the source of funding with the funder name and grant number.
- Include the statement on your submitted manuscript to retain your author’s rights.“For the purpose of open access, the author has applied a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence to any Author Accepted Manuscript version arising.”
- The published version or the Author Accepted Manuscript must be published with a Creative Commons Attribution Licence (CC BY). Authors can apply for a CC BY ND licence as an exception. To do so they must fill out this form. The process takes approximately 10-days.
- Include a data access statement to help readers locate the original research data (even if there is no data underpinning the research). For guidance on writing a statement, see our page about sharing research data, on the 'Citation' tab.
Routes to compliance
There are several routes available for UKRI-funded authors to comply with UKRI’s Open Access policy. Further guidance is available on URKI’s website:
- Publish in a fully Open Access journal or platform. Where costs are fair and reasonable, UKRI’s block grant will cover the Article Processing Charges for fully Open Access journals. For this option, please use our funding request form to apply for Open Access funding.
- Publish in a subscription (or hybrid) journal and make your Accepted Author Manuscript (AAM) immediately free by depositing in a repository. This route allows your paper to comply with the policy without the need for an open access charge to be paid. To follow this route, you must include the statement above to retain your author’s rights. Please note that not all publishers currently accept the statement. Contact openaccess@kcl.ac.uk if you would like help with retaining your author’s rights.
- Publish with a journal that is part of a King’s transformative agreement. King’s has signed a number of agreements (18 to date) with leading publishers, to pay a one-time fee to cover Article Processing Charges as well as read access. Each agreement is different, but to be eligible the article must have a King’s corresponding author. Please visit our Publisher Agreements webpage for more information.
- Publish in a Transformative Journal. To publish in subscription or hybrid journal, it must be considered a Transformative Journal as determined by JISC. The UKRI block grant can be used to cover open access fees for these journals, as long as the journal appears on JISC’s list and the Article Processing Charge is fair and reasonable.
MRC and BBSRC funded research
Authors that are funded in whole or in part by MRC and BBSRC have an additional requirement to deposit upon publication their research articles in Europe PubMed Central, in compliance with MRC’s Additional Terms and Conditions and BBSRC’s Safeguarding Good Research Policy.
Articles submitted before 1st April 2022
If you submitted a peer-reviewed original research article before 1st April 2022, the previous UKRI Open Access policy applies (April 2013 – March 2022). Please be aware that each Research Council can set their own Open Access requirements so policies may vary between councils.
UKRI's minimum requirement for compliance is for the author's accepted manuscript to be deposited in a repository and publicly accessible within 12 months of publication for STEM-articles and within 24-months for HASS (for MRC and BBSRC, it is necessary for the paper to be deposited in Europe PMC and made public no more than six months of publication). This means that you can comply for free, via the ‘green’ route to OA, provided your journal allows such a deposit.
If an APC is paid then the article must be published under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence. If choosing the green route, a licence exception of CC BY NC is allowed (CC BY NC ND is not allowed).