WMU Research Guides: Open Access Publishing: Journals

Types of OA Journal Models

Gold Open Access – The peer-reviewed journal is true Open Access.

The article (and Journal) will be universally accessible Immediate access.
No embargo period.
Researchers often pay to publish their articles. Fees can be written into grants, paid for by the institution, or sometimes fees are waived/reduced.
Publications fees differ greatly between Journals. Some Journals are not for profit (e.g., PLOS) others are for-profit (e.g., Biomed central). Traditional non-OA Journals often also as the author to pay a publishing fee.

Green Open Access - Article will be published in a traditional Journal, but pre-prints or post-prints may be archived in a repository

The author needs to retain its copyright of their publication. In non-OA Journals, author's give their copyright over to the publisher
There is usually a minimum, a 12-month embargo
Articles are scattered throughout the web and on a variety of repositories
Similar to Public Access Policies mandated by the U.S. Government

Hybrid Open Access - Author pays to publish their articles as OA, in a non-OA Journal

Journal is subscription/non-OA based but an individual author can pay to have their article OA
Scattering of OA articles throughout a Journal
Libraries and authors both pay fees - Double-dipping or a transitional stage?

Ulrichsweb (Global Serials Directory) This link opens in a new window
This directory provides detailed and authoritative information on serials published worldwide. It indicates whether a publication is refereed or is indexed.
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Cabells Journalytics (formerly Cabell's Directory of Publishing Opportunities) This link opens in a new window
Detailed listings of journals providing publishing opportunities. Coverage includes journals in business, computer science, education, psychology, and health administration. Includes address, contact information, and guidelines for submitting manuscripts for each journal listed.

Directory of Open Access Journals
A searchable database of academic and scholarly open access journals.
Public Library of Science (PLoS)
PLOS was founded as a nonprofit Open Access publisher, innovator and advocacy organization with a mission to advance progress in science and medicine by leading a transformation in research communication
Biomed Central
BioMed Central is an STM (Science, Technology and Medicine) publisher of 220 open access, online, peer-reviewed journals.
JURN directory
An organised links directory for the arts & humanities, listing selected open access or otherwise free ejournals.
Digital Commons Network
The Digital Commons Network brings together free, full-text scholarly articles from hundreds of universities and colleges worldwide.
Open Library of Humanities
The Open Library of Humanities (OLH) is a charitable organisation dedicated to publishing open access scholarship with no author-facing article processing charges (APCs). We are funded by an international consortium of libraries who have joined us in our mission to make scholarly publishing fairer, more accessible, and rigorously preserved for the digital future.
Publish and Flourish
Provides clear information about OA journals as well as APC information and visualization tools
WMU Open Journals
Open journals published by WMU, and hosted in the ScholarWorks repository.

Open Access Button
You can use the Open Access Button on journal articles. When you use the Button, it'll either take you straight to a free copy of the research article or help you ask the author to freely share the article with you.
Unpaywall Button
An open database of 22,835,493 free scholarly articles.We harvest Open Access content from over 50,000 publishers and repositories, and make it easy to find, track, and use.