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NIH Public Access Policy Help Guide

Explains the NIH Public Access Policy, the process for submitting peer reviewed articles to PubMed Central and using myNCBI to verify compliance.

Contact Your Librarian

Librarians can assist with questions about:

  1. locating PMCIDs and/or NIHMS IDs for submitted manuscripts;
  2. determining whether an article has already appeared in PubMed Central; or
  3. locating a journal’s general policy on NIH public access policy compliance.

Overview of the NIH Public Access Policy

The NIH Public Access Policy ensures that the public has access to the published results of NIH funded research. It requires investigators to submit final peer-reviewed journal manuscripts that arise from NIH funds to the digital archive PubMed Central upon acceptance for publication.  To help advance science and improve human health, the Policy requires that these papers are accessible to the public on PubMed Central immediately at the date of publication.

NOTE: Submission before July 1, 2025 had a 12-month embargo period for submission. That no longer applies in the updated 2024 NIH Public Access Policy.

The major components of complying with NIH Public Access Policy:

  • Determine Applicability
  • Address Copyright
  • Submit Manuscript to the NIH Manuscript Submission System (NIHMS) for Deposit into PubMed Central (PMC)
  • Show Evidence of Compliance

The Principal Investigtor (PI) is ultimately responsible for ensuring compliance with the NIH Public Access Policy.

Updated NIH Public Access Policy

On April 30, the NIH announced that the updated NIH Public Access Policy will now go into effect on July 1, 2025, rather than the end of the year as previously scheduled. Existing guidelines remain in place until that point. The new policy applies to all manuscripts accepted for publication after July 1, 2025.

Key Policy Changes

Removal of 12 month embargo period

The NIH previously allowed up to 12 months for submission into PubMed Central. The updated policy requires authors to make the publication immediately available on the Official Date of Publication, through one of two methods:

  1. Submission of the electronic version of the Author Accepted Manuscript to PubMed Central upon its acceptance for publication, for public availability without embargo upon the Official Date of Publication, or
  2. Submission of the Final Published Article to PubMed Central from journals or publishers with formal agreements with NLM, upon the Official Date of Publication, for public availability without embargo.

Author Acknowledgement

An acknowledgment in the Author Accepted Manuscript and Final Published Article that satisfies the requirements in the NIH Grants Policy Statement (GPS) regarding communicating and acknowledging federal funding (GPS 4.2.1 and GPS 8.2.1)

Government Use License

When accepting NIH funding, recipients grant the NIH permission to make Author Accepted Manuscripts resulting from that funding available in PubMed Central.

Authors submitting the Author Accepted Manuscript to PubMed Central will need to agree to a Government Use License statement with similar scope, currently written as, “I hereby grant to NIH, a royalty-free, nonexclusive, and irrevocable right to reproduce, publish, or otherwise use this work for Federal purposes and to authorize others to do so. This grant of rights includes the right to make the final, peer-reviewed manuscript publicly available in PubMed Central upon the Official Date of Publication.”

See the Supplemental Guidance to the 2024 NIH Public Access Policy: Government Use License and Rights for more information.

New Definitions

Author Accepted Manuscript (AAM)

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 (FPA)

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.