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“Open Access research brings benefits to researchers, students, institutions, governments, public bodies, professionals and practitioners, citizen scientists and many others”.
What's next after REF 2021?
The Open Access Policy for REF 2029 was published on 11 Dec 2024, with revised terms coming into effect for journal articles and conference papers published on or after 1 Jan 2026.
Articles which are not published with 'gold' open access can comply through 'green' open access to the accepted manuscript. It is not necessary to pay for open access publishing in order to be eligible for REF submission.
This table summarises key amendments to the Policy from REF 2021 to REF 2029:
| REF 2021 Open Access Policy | REF 2029 Open Access Policy |
|---|---|
| Articles must be deposited in an institutional repository within 3 months of acceptance. | Articles must be deposited in an institutional repository within 3 months of publication. |
| Articles published with open access should be licensed CC-BY-NC-ND at minimum. | Articles published with open access should be licensed as openly as possible (CC-BY is strongly recommended). |
| An accepted manuscript may be embargoed for up to 12 months (Panels A & B) or 24 months (Panels C & D). | An accepted manuscript may be embargoed for up to 6 months (Panels A & B) or 12 months (Panels C & D). |
| The Policy does not apply to longer form works (books and chapters). | The Policy does not yet apply to longer form works (books and chapters), although these outputs will come into scope immediately for the next REF after 2029. |
Exceptions may be applicable in circumstances where authors or institutions have difficulty complying with the policy, such as:
- The author has moved to a new institution since the article was originally submitted.
- The accepted manuscript cannot be obtained from the corresponding author.
- The most appropriate journal for the article does not allow open access to the accepted manuscript within the permitted timeframe.
Exception requests will be managed by Faculty REF leads, Library staff and the Research Office.
University of Hull process for complying with REF Open Access criteria
Authors who utilized Worktribe to deposit outputs which complied with the Open Access policy for REF 2021 do not need to change their practices for REF 2029.
It is the author's responsibility to ensure that their output records in Worktribe are up-to-date:
- Don't leave records in progress, as this risks missing the deposit deadline.
- Ensure that every record of a journal article or conference contribution published in a proceedings series has a file attached: the final accepted manuscript (after peer review and amendments), or the published version if it has an open licence.
- If you have any questions about actions required on specific Worktribe records, use the record 'Comments' tab (tag your comment '@Library'), or contact worktribe@hull.ac.uk
- Refer to the Worktribe Sharepoint site for guides and FAQs
Researchers are requested to introduce new colleagues to Worktribe and direct them to the Sharepoint site for help getting started.
This is a simplified representation of the Worktribe process for complying with REF 2029 Open Access Policy. Not every scenario is captured by this visualisation.
Who Can Help?
Library staff responsible for managing the University's Research Repository can answer queries about output records in Worktribe: worktribe@hull.ac.uk
The University's Research and Innovation Office has overall responsibility for managing the institutional submission.
