OA Publishing Agreements

The Library actively pursues OA publishing agreements (also known as transformative agreements) with publishers that both:

Cover article processing charges (APCs) for HKBU authors
Maintain or even enhance existing journal subscriptions

publishers signed

607

APC quotas approved since 2020

Note:

Publishers treat HKBU and BNBU as separate entities under OA agreements. Only HKBU staff and students can enjoy the deals.
Always use your HKBU email to submit manuscripts to access APC waivers!
Choose a CC BY license for greatest visibility and reuse of your work. If you are concerned about commercial reuse, choose CC BY-NC-ND
Not every journal from each publisher may be eligible. Please check and confirm that the journal you want to publish in is eligible before submitting your manuscript.

	Eligibility for OA Fee Waiver ⓘ	Eligibility for OA Fee Waiver ⓘ	Quota	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ	Savings (per article)
1.	Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) (since Jan 2024)	Waived for all hybrid and gold journals Eligible for research articles, review articles, and conference or proceedings papers Corresponding authors only	Quota: Unlimited	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ Unlimited	Savings (per article) Up to USD 1,800
		Application procedure: After your article is accepted, the publisher will send you an email to the eRights form, where you can choose to use the free token.
2.	American Chemical Society (ACS) (since Jan 2022)	Waived for all journals Corresponding authors only	Quota: 77	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ 43	Savings (per article) Up to USD 4,500
		Application procedure: After your article is accepted, the publisher will send you an email to the Rightslink, where you can choose to use the free token.
3.	Cambridge University Press (CUP) (since Jan 2021)	Waived for 370+ journals Eligible for Research Articles, Review Articles, Rapid Communications, Brief Reports, Case Reports Excludes Book reviews, Discussions, Editorials, Introductions, Letters, Meeting reports, and Proceedings Corresponding authors only	Quota: Unlimited	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ Unlimited	Savings (per article) Up to USD 4,920
		Application procedure: After your article is accepted, the publisher will send you an email to the Rightslink, where you can choose to use the free token.
4.	The Company of Biologists (since Jan 2023)	Waived for all 5 journals Eligible for Research articles, Short reports, Tools & techniques, Methods & techniques, Short communications, Research reports, Techniques & resources article, Techniques & resources report, and Resource articles	Quota: Unlimited	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ Unlimited	Savings (per article) Up to USD 2,200
		Application procedure: After your article is accepted, the publisher will send you an email to the Rightslink, where you can choose to use the free token.
5.	De Gruyter (since Jan 2025)	Waived for selected journals Corresponding authors only	Quota: Unlimited	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ Unlimited	Savings (per article) Up to EUR 2,300
		Application procedure: You are automatically set to enjoy the token for S2O journals. For other journals, after your article is accepted, the publisher will send you an email to the Rightslink, where you can choose to use the free token.
6.	Elsevier New! (since Jan 2025)	Waived for all hybrid journals of Freedom Collection Eligible for Case reports; Data in Briefs; Full-length articles; Micro-articles; Original software publication; Practice guidelines; Protocols; Review articles; Replication studies; Short communications; Short surveys; Video articles Corresponding authors only	Quota: 70	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ 9	Savings (per article) Up to USD 10,400
		Application procedure: After your article is accepted, the publisher will send you an email to the post acceptance author journey, where you can choose to use the free token.
7.	IEEE (since Dec 2022)	Waived for all journals Excludes conference proceedings Corresponding authors only	Quota: 17	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ 4	Up to USD 2,995
		Application procedure: After your article is accepted, the publisher will send you an email to the Rightslink, where you can choose to use the free token.
8.	Institute of Physics (IOP) (since Jan 2024)	Waived for all hybrid and Gold OA journals Excludes conference proceedings Primary/corresponding authors only	Quota: Unlimited	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ Unlimited	Savings (per article) Up to USD 4,680
		Application procedure: You are automatically set to enjoy the token.
9.	John Benjamins New! (since Jan 2025)	Waived for all journals Corresponding authors only	Quota: Unlimited	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ Unlimited	Savings (per article) Up to EUR 1,800
		Application procedure: You are automatically set to enjoy the token.
10.	Oxford University Press (OUP) New! (since Jan 2025)	Waived for all hybrid journals Eligible for research articles, review articles, brief reports and case reports. Articles in supplements (i.e. specifically designated issues supplementary to a journal's usual publication, often sponsored by third parties), are excluded. Corresponding authors only	Quota: Unlimited	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ Unlimited	Savings (per article) Up to USD 8,000
		Application procedure: You are automatically set to enjoy the token.
11.	Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) (since Jan 2023)	Waived for all hybrid journals Eligible for all research and review-type articles Corresponding authors only	Quota: 12	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ 0	Savings (per article) Up to GBP 3,000
		Application procedure: You are automatically set to enjoy the token.
12.	Springer (since Jan 2024)	Waived for all hybrid journals Eligible for Original paper, Review paper, Brief communication, and Continuing education Corresponding authors only	Quota: 38	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ 8	Savings (per article) Up to USD 5,990
		Application procedure: After your article is accepted, the publisher will send you an email to the SpringerNature Article Approval Service, where you can choose to use the free token.
13.	Taylor & Francis (T&F) (since Jan 2023)	Waived for all hybrid journals Corresponding authors only	Quota: 65	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ 9	Savings (per article) Up to USD 4,800
		Application procedure: After your article is accepted, the publisher will send you an email to the T&F System, where you can choose to use the free token.
14.	Wiley (since Jan 2023)	Waived for all fully OA and hybrid journals Eligible for Case study, Commentary, Data article, Education, Lecture, Method and protocol, Perspective, Practice and policy, Rapid publication, Research article, Review article, Short communication, and Technical note Corresponding authors only	Quota: 54	Real-time Quota Availability ⓘ 0	Savings (per article) Up to USD 6,730
		Application procedure: For fully OA journals, authors will arrive at Wiley Open Access Dashboard (WOAD) upon manuscript submission to choose to use the free token. We will approve your request only after the article is accepted. For hybrid journals, authors will be led to WOAD after the peer review process.

SCOAP3

Effective between 2025 and 2027, all HKBU faculty and students can publish OA in SCOAP3 Journals 2025-2027 – SCOAP3 free of charge.

Application Instructions

When you receive an email from the publisher that contains this type of information, please remember to always select "Open Access" or "Gold Open Access".

For publishers using RightsLink:

Screenshot of Cambridge University Press article submission form showing 'Access Information' section. The form explains a read and publish agreement covering APC costs, allowing Gold Open Access publishing at no cost. Gold Open Access is selected among access options. Below, authors are prompted to select a Creative Commons license for their article, with three options: CC BY, CC BY-NC-SA, or CC BY-NC-ND, all currently unchecked.