Open Access
Briefings in Bioinformatics is now fully open access
Oxford University Press is pleased to announce that Briefings in Bioinformatics has become a fully open access journal beginning with the 2024 volume.
Find out more about the change below.
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What if I submitted my manuscript in 2023, but it does not publish until 2024?
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If I cannot afford the open access fee, what are my options?
Why has the journal become open access?
We believe that open science brings great benefits to our research community and the wider world. For the last quarter century, Briefings in Bioinformatics has published the highest quality review articles and, more recently, research articles in the field. By making all of its content freely available to read, the journal expands its reach to anyone globally working in the field.
As a gold OA journal, Briefings in Bioinformatics will be compliant with the growing number of funder, institutional, and national mandates that require publication in a gold open access journal. You can find out more about this, including whether your funding agency mandates OA, here.
This change has no impact on the journal’s editorial policy, standards, or processes.
When did the change to open access take place?
Briefings in Bioinformatics began publishing as a fully open access journal with the opening of Volume 25 in January 2024. Prior to that, all articles published in issues in 2023 had the option to publish under the standard hybrid license or an OA license if the authors opted to publish OA. The APC will be waived for articles submitted at any time during 2022 or 2023 that are already available online under a non-OA publishing license but end up being published in a Volume 25 (2024) issue.
What if I submit my manuscript in 2023, but it does not publish until 2024?
We know that there will be instances where an author has submitted their manuscript in 2023, but the manuscript is either not accepted until 2024 or their article is not published until 2024. Therefore, we gave authors as much lead time as possible to know that the journal’s publishing model is changing. However, any new submissions from August 2023 will likely publish in the 2024 volume if accepted and must therefore publish under an OA license. If you have any questions or concerns about this, please contact the editorial office at briefings@oup.com.
How can I access older archived content?
With the move to fully OA, all archived Briefings in Bioinformatics content is free to access starting in 2024.
Licensing
Open access articles will continue to be published under Creative Commons licenses. Authors publishing in Briefings in Bioinformatics will publish under the Creative Commons Attribution license (CC BY) or a Creative Commons NonCommercial license (CC BY-NC) for their articles.
Article Processing Charges (APCs)
From October 2023, the journal’s APC will be as follows:
Reviews, Problem Solving Protocols, Case Studies, Opinion Articles
APC: Details of the open access licences and open access charges
The following article categories automatically receive APC waivers: Letter to the Editor, Corrigendum
OUP has a growing number of Read and Publish agreements with institutions and consortia that provide funding for open access publishing. This means authors from participating institutions can publish open access, and the institution may pay the charge. Find out if your institution is participating.
If I cannot afford the open access fee, what are my options?
Waivers will be granted to scientists working in developing countries as part of OUP’s Developing Countries Initiative.
It's important to us that authors are not excluded from publishing in the journal because of a financial barrier. Applications for a waiver from authors whose APC is not covered by a Read and Publish agreement and who are not from a developing country will be considered on a case-by-case basis. We accept and respect that there are many valid reasons for an author being unable to pay the APC; therefore, if you would like OUP to consider a discretionary partial or full waiver, please visit this page to find a link for a waiver request form and instructions on who to send this to for consideration. Please note that waiver applications must be submitted prior to acceptance for consideration.
