It’s a familiar scenario. You’ve completed your research, written up your findings, and selected a target journal - which has sent your article out for review and accepted your work for publication! You decide that you want to publish your research in an Open Access format to ensure that your findings are widely and equitably accessible. You convey your intentions to your publisher only to discover that they want you to pay a hefty Article Processing Charge (APC) in order to publish in an Open Access format. Shocked by the price, you go to your department chair with fingers crossed and request the funds to cover the fee. If you’re lucky, there are funds to cover the APC, but if not, you may find yourself having to reconsider publishing in an OA format.
How can you be better prepared for the next time you try to publish in an Open Access format? Article processing charges frequently range from $2,000-$5,000 or more. Therefore, knowing how to identify these fees early in your research process may help you to better explore publishing options and account for costs. But finding exact costs on publisher websites can be challenging - many are located on supplemental spreadsheets that can be difficult to find. The following list can help you locate APCs for many prominent science journal publishers:
- Elsevier (click “download APC prices” button): https://www.elsevier.com/about/policies/pricing
- Taylor & Francis: https://authorservices.taylorandfrancis.com/publishing-open-access/open-access-cost-finder/
- Springer Nature (click “2022 Spring Nature Hybrid journals” link): https://www.springernature.com/gp/open-research/journals-books/journals
- Wiley (click on “Hybrid OA Price List”): https://authorservices.wiley.com/author-resources/Journal-Authors/open-access/article-publication-charges.html
Looking for an APC not included on the lists above? Reach out to Sara Hoover, Metadata and Scholarly Publishing Librarian at shoover@gwu.edu for assistance.
For more information on this topic, see Himmelfarb’s video tutorials:
