Publications supported by us must cite our grant number and be submitted to PubMed Central in compliance with the NIH Public Access Policy.
2024 NIH Public Access Policy (Effective July 1, 2025) replaces the 2008 policy which allowed 12 months before public access compliance.
From that date forward, more types of research funded by the NIH must be shared with the public immediately. This replaces the 2008 policy which allowed 12 months before public access compliance.
| Research Output Type |
Required to Share Before July 1, 2025 |
Required After July 1, 2025 |
|---|---|---|
| Peer-reviewed journal articles | Yes |
Yes |
| Conference proceedings | No |
Yes |
| Book chapters | No |
Yes |
| Preprints | No |
Yes |
| Other scholarly ouputs on NIH-Funded research | No |
Yes |
The table above highlights the types of research outputs that must now comply with the new policy: Timely submission: If you have an NIH grant and your article, conference proceeding information, book chapter, preprint, or other scholarly output is accepted for publication on or after July 1, 2025, you’ll need to submit the final peer-reviewed version (before the journal adds any formatting or typesetting) to PubMed Central. You must make your article publicly available immediately. There is no longer a waiting period. The day your article appears online is the day it must be open to the public.
How to Submit: Senior authors or authors of record are generally responsible for submitting the manuscript to PubMed Central. The NIH Manuscript Submission System (NIHMS) supports many login routes to authenticate different types of users. When accessing the system select your login route based on who supports your research and how.
Goal of this change: If you receive NIH funding and publish results, your articles must be made freely available in a public database (such as PubMed Central) as soon as they are accepted for publication. This ensures that patients, families, researchers, and the general public can access NIH- funded research results without having to pay, supporting transparency and open access to publicly funded science.
Compliance: When you accept NIH funding, your grant agreement includes Federal Purpose License—a copyright license that gives the U.S. government certain rights to use, reproduce, and share works (like manuscripts, data, or inventions) that are developed with federal funding. If you create something with federal funding, the government gets a free, non-exclusive license to use it for any federal business or public purpose—even though you still own the copyright. The compliance language encourages authors to acknowledge this language of the Federal Purpose License in publications. The Federal Purpose License exists before agreements with publishers.
What do researchers need to do?
There are currently four methods for publishing that are compliant with NIH Public Access Policy requirements. These methods outline how authors and/or publishers submit articles to PubMed Central (PMC) to meet the NIH's compliance requirements. Please note that the author is ultimately responsible for publication submission requirements.
Method A: The publisher automatically submits the final published article to PMC.
The official, up-to-date list of these publishers at the National Library of Medicine:
- NIH Public Access Policy: Journals That Submit Articles to PMC
- PubMed Central: Journal List
Method B: The author plans with the publisher to deposit the final published article in PMC.
Method C: The author or a designee submits the final peer-reviewed manuscript to the NIH Manuscript Submission System (NIHMS).
Method D: The publisher submits the manuscript to NIHMS, and the author or designee completes the remaining steps in the submission process.
| Allowable Costs | Unallowable Costs |
|---|---|
| Article processing charges (APCs) for open access journals (if reasonable and justified) | Fees for submitting Author Accepted Manuscripts to PubMed Central |
| Page charges for journal publications that impartially charge all authors | Journal/publisher fees charged solely for submission to PubMed Central |
| Costs for publishing in electronic or print formats (e.g., distribution, promotion, general handling) | Costs for services that do not result in a publicly available product (e.g., peer review with no publication outcome) |
| Costs for color figures, supplemental materials, or data sharing (if required by the journal and justified) | Costs for publishing services are already covered by institutional agreements (i.e., double charging) |
| Costs incurred before closing out for publication or sharing of research findings | Costs for services incurred after award closeout |
| Reasonable costs for editing, formatting, or preparing a manuscript for publication | Costs charged differentially because a manuscript is subject to the NIH Public Access Policy |
| Costs for acknowledging NIH support or including disclaimers as required | Costs for non-publication services (e.g., expedited review fees not resulting in publication) |
Key Notes:
- Submission to PubMed Central (PMC) is free of charge. Authors should not incur any fees for depositing manuscripts into PMC.
- All costs must be reasonable, allocatable, and conform to NIH cost principles.
- Publication costs may be charged as either direct or indirect costs, provided they are justified and included in the approved budget.
- Understand the appropriate NIH-designated repository for your research output. Ensure submissions comply with NIH guidelines.
- Seek assistance if needed. For questions regarding compliance, consult your institution’s grants office or NIH program official.
| Research Output Type | NIH Designated Repository |
| Peer-reviewed articles | PubMed Central |
| Preprints | PubMed Central |
| Book chapters, proceedings | Currently: PubMed Central |
Data Management and Sharing Policy 2023 established that results, protocols, and summary-level data from clinical trials must be publicly available and easy to access:
Please see the Case Research Data Library Management resources for tools and guidance.
For additional questions about copyright, compliance and support, contact ask.