NIH Public Access Policy

NIH released an updated Public Access Policy on December 17, 2024. This revised policy is in response to the White House Office of Science and Technology memo "Ensuring Free, Immediate, and Equitable Access to Federally Funded Research". The policy was open for public comment and informed by the submitted feedback to the draft policy.

The updated 2024 Public Access Policy is effective for manuscripts accepted for publication on or after July 1, 2025. Note that the original implimentation was set for December 31, 2025, but was accelerated by the new NIH Director. The 2008 policy remains in effect until July 1, 2025.

From the NIH 2024 Public Access Policy, for manuscripts that are accepted for publication on or after July 1, 2025 the following applies:

1. No more embargo: full text manuscripts from NIH funded research must be made available immediately upon the Official Date of Publication in PubMed Central.
2. Authors must include an acknowledgement of federal funding in the Author Accepted Manuscript and Final Published Article. Find official language for this acknowledgement in the supplemental guidance to the policy.
3. Authors submitting manuscripts to PMC (through NIHMS) will be required to agree to a standard license that explicitly grants NIH the right to make the AAM publicly available on PMC without embargo. More information is available in the supplemental guidance to the policy.
4. Publisher fees for depositing the AAM to PubMed Central are not allowed, though publication costs for open access publishing of the final article are still allowed. Authors will continue to be able to deposit the AAM without having to pay.

These updated definitions appear in the NIH 2024 Public Access Policy

• Author Accepted Manuscript: The author’s final version that has been accepted for journal publication and includes all revisions resulting from the peer review process, including all associated tables, graphics, and supplemental material.
• Final Published Article: The journal's authoritative copy, including journal or publisher copyediting and stylistic edits, and formatting changes, even prior to the compilation of a volume or issue or the assignment of associated metadata.
• Journal: A periodical publication that is either 1) included in the “journal” section of the National Library of Medicine (NLM) Catalog or 2) meets all of the following criteria:
  • Requirements for ISSN assignment;
  • Content is issued over time under a common title;
  • Is a collection of articles by different authors; and
  • Is intended to be published indefinitely.
• Official Date of Publication: The date on which the Final Published Article is first made available in final, edited form, whether in print or electronic (i.e., online) format.