What is Hybrid Open Access?
Hybrid Open Access Publishing is a blended business model used by many publishers. Hybrid Open Access journals use the traditional publishing model, requiring users to pay for access to content, while giving authors “options” for publishing their individual papers Open Access. Authors who wish to use the Open Access “options” are required to pay a fee to make their paper available Open Access, while the other content of this journal is only accessible to those who pay the subscription fee. Although Hybrid Open Access allows authors some choice in retaining copyright to their work, these publishers are double dipping. Hybrid Open Access articles aren’t always as findable as the publishers claim. Furthermore, Institutions are often billed twice by these publishers: one bill for publishing the research conducted at the institution, and another bill to Libraries for access. Often, these Hybrid Open Access journals are bundled into huge journal deals from vendors, leading Institutions to believe they are getting value for their licensing terms, when, in fact, many of the articles included in those journals are already freely available.
In order to be considered fully Open Access, all the journal’s content should be available freely to any user. Any journal that offers access to only some articles is a Hybrid Open Access publisher. If you need to know whether or not a journal is using a Hybrid Open Access publishing model, here are some questions to ask about the journal:
- Does the journal have subscription fees? Or, do you have to be a member of a professional organization in order to access journal content? If the answer is yes, this is a Hybrid Open Access journal.
- Does the journal offer Open Access “options”? If the answer is yes, this is likely a Hybrid Open Access journal.