Pay an Article Processing Charge (APC)

Article Processing Charge (APC) discounts and waivers

Some publishers charge authors fees, known as APCs (article processing charges), to publish open access. There are many ways to make your work open access (OA) without paying a fee, but this page provides information about discount and waiver options available to University of Minnesota authors.

The Libraries does not pay APCs

UMN Libraries does not encourage paying APCs for hybrid OA and we do not have funding available to pay APCs for any individual articles. In general, the introduction of APCs has not led to broad systemic change toward open access and have instead contributed to an increasingly unsustainable and inequitable ecosystem for scholarly publishing.

The Libraries focus on global, collaborative, and strategic investments that will have greater overall impact, fostering more accessible and sustainable models of scholarly publication. The following sustainable open access options align with these efforts:

Diamond open access: DOAJ lists over 14,000 APC-free journals.
Subscribe-to-Open (S2O): list of journals that follow the subscribe-to-open model and do not have APCs.
Scholarly-owned infrastructure that enables immediate sharing of work.

While we prioritize the pathways above, the Libraries has agreements with certain publishers that make it possible for University of Minnesota-affiliated authors to obtain discounts on APCs.

Current APC agreements

University of Minnesota authors are covered by a number of agreements with certain publishers that provide APC discounts or waive APCs entirely. Eligibility is based on the date of article acceptance, and agreements may be subject to change at any time; check the publishers' website for details before submitting. Contact [email protected] with questions about specific agreements.

American Chemical Society (ACS): As subscribers to the All Publications package, UMN-authors are covered under a "read and green" agreement with ACS, which allows them to upload their accepted manuscript to their institutional repository (the University Digital Conservancy) or a repository required by their funder (e.g., PubMed Central, DOE PAGES) without paying an "article development charge".
ACM Open (Association for Computing Machinery): In partnership with the College of Science and Engineering, corresponding authors affiliated with the University of Minnesota (Twin Cities campus) are eligible for a waiver of article processing charges in ACM. Authors must use their @umn.edu email address to be identified as eligible. The agreement runs from January 1, 2026 to December 31, 2028 and eligibility is based on acceptance date.
Biochemical Society and Portland Press: The University of Minnesota is participating in the Biochemical Society's read and publish pilot program. Through our participation, all articles accepted for publication from UMN (all campuses) corresponding authors are free of any APC charges. Authors must use their @umn.edu email address to be identified as eligible. This agreement runs through December 31, 2026. Eligibility is based on acceptance date.
BMC concluded]: The agreement offering University of Minnesota Twin Cities authors a discount on BMC article processing charges ended December 31, 2025. Articles accepted after this date are not eligible for the discount.
Cambridge University Press (CUP): Through the Big Ten Academic Alliance, research articles, case reports, brief reports, review articles, and rapid communications with a UMN-affiliated (all campuses) corresponding author* are eligible to publish their work OA in CUP Gold or Hybrid OA journals (downloadable list) with no fee. *Must be the corresponding author handling the manuscript and correspondence during the publication process.NOTE: Authors must use their @umn.edu email address to be identified as eligible and eligibility is based on acceptance date. This agreement runs from January 1, 2024 to December 31, 2026.
Cogitatio Press: The Libraries supports Cogitatio Press, which publishes four fully open access journals. UMN corresponding authors can publish with no charge.
Company of Biologists: UMN is participating in an agreement with the Company of Biologists through 2026. The agreement allows articles with a corresponding author from the University of Minnesota Twin Cities to be published OA at no cost to the author in Development, Journal of Cell Science, and Journal of Experimental Biology. Guidance for authors is available through the Company of Biologists webpage. Authors must use their @umn.edu email address to be identified as eligible and eligibility is based on acceptance date.
Dryad [concluded]: UMN has an agreement with the data repository Dryad through which publishing charges and overage fees are waived until December 31, 2025. Submission to Dryad is a requirement for some journals.
IOP Publishing: Through an agreement with the BTAA and IOP, articles with a corresponding author from UMN are eligible for a $0 APC. The agreement with IOP allows for original research and review articles to be published as open access in all journals that participate in IOP's transformative agreements, including most of its fully open access and hybrid open access journals. A small number of journals attach additional charges including, but not limited to, page charges. These remain the responsibility of the authors. Authors must use their @umn.edu email address to be identified as eligible. This agreement ends December 31, 2026. Eligibility is based on acceptance date.
Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development (JAFSCD): The Libraries are shareholders with the Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development. Authors from all campuses are able to publish without paying an APC for articles accepted before December 31, 2026.
Microbiology Society: University of Minnesota is participating in the Microbiology Society's Publish and Read program through the Big Ten Academic Alliance. To be eligible, the corresponding author must be from UMN, use their @umn.edu email address. Authors must use their @umn.edu email address to be identified as eligible. This agreement runs through December 31, 2028. Eligibility is based on acceptance date.
Nucleic Acids Research [concluded]: Oxford University Press has discontinued the Nucleic Acids Research membership program. The discount for UMN authors is no longer available.
Open Book Publishers: The Libraries supports Open Book Publishers, which publishes academic monographs, edited volumes, textbooks and reports in humanities, social sciences and the sciences. Authors submit their manuscript to a rigorous peer review process and, if accepted, the monograph will be published open access at no cost to the authors.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences: The Libraries' subscription to Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences allows UMN-affiliated authors a discounted open access fee of $4,975 for immediate OA with a CC BY-NC-ND license. Note that all articles require a publication fee and are free to read six months after publication.
Science Advances: Members of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) are eligible for a 4% discount on the APC for Science Advances.
SpringerOpen [concluded]: The agreement offering a discount on Springer's fully open access journal article processing charges ended December 31, 2025. Articles accepted after this date are not eligible for the discount.Note that Springer hybrid open access journals are covered by an agreement with Springer.
Springer (hybrid only): Through the Big Ten Academic Alliance, the University of Minnesota is participating in an agreement that waives APCs for Original Papers, Review Papers, Brief Communications, and Continuing Education articles where the responsible corresponding author is from the University of Minnesota (Twin Cities, Crookston, Duluth, and Morris campuses). The agreement covers only hybrid open access journals ("Springer" Imprint and "Hybrid" Publishing Model in the downloadable list). Authors must use their @umn.edu email address and select University of Minnesota as their affiliation. Manually entering affiliation will result in a delay of article processing. The agreement runs until December 31, 2026. Eligibility is based on acceptance date.
Wiley: The University of Minnesota is part of an agreement with Wiley through the Big Ten Academic Alliance. APCs will be waived for publishing in Wiley's hybrid ("Online Open" or "Offers Open Access") journals through December 31, 2027. Eligibility is based on acceptance date. There is a cap on the number of articles eligible for coverage in Wiley's fully OA ("Gold") journals. Articles submitted before August 31, 2026 will be covered by the agreement. APCs for articles submitted after August 31, 2026 will be the responsibility of the author. Wiley's journal finder has a filter for Access Options. The agreement covers primary research and review articles where the responsible corresponding author is from the University of Minnesota (Twin Cities, Rochester, Duluth, or Morris campuses). Authors must use their @umn.edu email address and select University of Minnesota as their affiliation to be identified as eligible.
Other available discounts: Occasionally, publishers offer limited discounts on open access/article process charges. UMN authors are encouraged to ask their publishers if there are any available discounts.

Always read the fine print

For journals that are not covered under an agreement, check your journal’s website and have funding lined up before you submit your article. You can ask the publisher to waive your APC, but be careful! If you are going to ask for a waiver, do that before you agree to pay any fees you can’t afford.

Click-through forms or signed agreements may show up as early as the first step in submitting your article. Read submission content closely and be sure you know what you are agreeing to; you will owe the publisher the APC if it is not waived.

What about books?

Book processing charges (BPCs) also exist and have become a part of some publishers’ business models for scholarly monographs and edited volumes. The environment around publishing scholarly book-length works continues to evolve. As with journals, the Libraries supports initiatives with book publishers that can reduce or eliminate BPCs and does not have funding to cover individual BPCs.

For more information on options for publishing open-access book-length works, contact Publishing Services at [email protected].

Contact

For more information, contact [email protected].