Types of open access

There are three main types of open access, green, gold and hybrid:

Green

The author publishes in a traditional, subscription-based journal but also deposits a copy (usually the final author version - the author’s final manuscript incorporating all changes resulting from peer review) in a repository, such as Research Space Repository. The published version of the journal sits behind a subscription paywall, but the “final author version” is available to anyone subject to any embargo period imposed by the publisher.

The final author version looks something like this (below). This is the version that should be deposited in your institutional repository.

Below is what the published article might look like. You can see it has been typeset by the publisher and includes the publisher’s logos. Do not deposit this version into your repository unless you have published your article as gold open access (see below). 

Gold

The full text of the article is accessible to anyone, without subscription charge, from the journal's website. However, the author needs to pay the publisher an Article Processing Charge (APC).

Hybrid

This is a subscription journal that has some open access articles published in it - these are made open access on payment of an APC. The rest of the articles in the journal are behind a paywall, but authors can choose to make these open access via the green route (see above).

You may also hear about diamond or platinum open access. These forms of open access are where the article is published as open access immediately, but without the author having to pay an APC.