About OALib

What is OALib? What is OALib Journal?

Open Access Library (OALib) consists of:

  • the Search Engine, based on a database with metadata of Open Access (OA) papers

  • the Journal with OALib Articles,

  • the Index with metadata entries of external OA journal articles,

  • the Repository with own OALib PrePrints as well as external preprints and postprints, all stored in one of the 322 OALib Disciplinary Repositories.

OALib is currently hosting links and metadata to more than 5,776,453 open access articles covering a wide range of academic disciplines. All full text articles from your search results are free to download.

OALib Journal is a scholarly, peer-reviewed, open access journal covering all subject areas in STM (Science, Technology and Medicine) as well as Social Sciences. The OALib Articles from the OALib Journal are stored in the Open Access Library (OALib).

The Open Access Library and its Journal are operated by Open Access Library Inc.


What is Open Access?

The definition of Open Access (OA) to peer-reviewed research literature as stated by the Budapest Open Access Initiative (BOAI):

"... free availability on the public internet, permitting any users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of these articles, ... or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. The only constraint ... should be to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly acknowledged and cited."

There are two primary strategies put forward in the BOAI to attain this goal:

  • Open Access through journals (also called “gold OA”). Price is a barrier to access. [Therefore,] these ... journals will not charge subscription or access fees, and will turn to other methods for covering their expenses. There are ... foundations and governments that fund research, ... endowments set up by discipline or institution, ... or even contributions from the researchers themselves.

  • Open Access through repositories (also called “green OA”). Scholars need the tools and assistance to deposit their refereed journal articles in open electronic archives, a practice commonly called, self-archiving ... A repository is suitable for this purpose when it ... supports interoperability with other repositories, and takes steps toward long-term preservation ... Every publishing scholar in every field and country, including those not affiliated with institutions of higher education, should have deposit rights in an OA repository.


What Kind of Services Does OALib Provide?

OALib provides the technical means for “every publishing scholar in every field and country” in accordance with the “recommendations for the next 10 years” (expressed for the time up to 2022) of the Budapest Open Access Initiative for the gold and the green Open Access strategy. As such OALib is a “one stop shop”. OALib understands also the needs of scholars in developing countries. OALib offers many publishing options for free, while at the same time working with a viable business plan to ensure a continuing service for the academic community.

Open Access Library (OALib) Services

General OA (applicable to Gold and Green OA)

  • OALib Search: A search engine dedicated to open access scholarly articles. The search engine reaches all content on the Internet that can be crawled. It harvests metadata only of those articles that are available in full text.

Gold OA (Journals)

  • OALib Journal a scholarly, peer-reviewed, open access journal covering all subject areas in STM (Science, Technology and Medicine) as well as Social Sciences. OALib Journal organizes the peer-review process and provides typesetting and publication services for Article Processing Charges (APC) of US$ 99 for each accepted OALib Article.

  • OALib Index: Authors who have published in any other open access journal and do not want to rely or wait for OALib Search Engine to discover their article, can submit metadata and the link to the published Open Access article for indexing. Indexing can also be initiated by other scholars who are not the author. (free)

Green OA (Disciplinary Repositories)

  • Authors can submit a manuscript to OALib PrePrints for preliminary review, typesetting, and deposit in one of 322 Disciplinary Repositories. (free)

  • Authors can submit external preprints from any other journal together with its metadata to OALib Disciplinary Repository for inclusion in one of 322 Disciplinary Repositories. (free)

  • Authors can submit external postprints from any other journal together with its metadata to OALib Disciplinary Repository for inclusion in one of 322 Disciplinary Repositories. (free)

Preprints are articles before peer review. Postprints are articles after peer review, but still in the author’s layout and typesetting. Your author's rights with respect to depositing of your preprints and postprints from other journals can be found on Sherpa/RoMEO.



What are the Benefits for Authors?

The Open Access Library (OALib) offers all services for gold and green OA you can possibly think of. It is a “one stop shop” for authors and readers. Indexing and depositing services are offered to everyone free of charge – even to authors who are not publishing with OALib. But, why go somewhere else? Publish your article with OALib Journal for US$ 99. If this is too much for you, let OALib check and deposit your preprint for you – for free. Here are the details:

  • OALib PrePrints: Submit a manuscript and go through a fast preliminary review followed by typesetting and deposit in one of 322 Disciplinary Repositories (free). Note: Preprints are not formally peer-reviewed and are counted only as “deposited” not as “published”! This however means, you can later still go the second step with your preprint and submit it for publication in the OALib Journal or in any other journal.

  • OALib Journal: Submit a manuscript for the peer review process, typesetting, and publication as an OALib Article in the OALib Journal, and then allocated to one of the 322 subject areas (for US$99). Since OALib Journal covers all disciplines from STM and Social Sciences, authors will not face the problem to be “out of scope” of the journal. OALib Journal evaluates articles based only on an objective determination of scientific and methodological soundness, not on subjective determinations of 'impact,' 'novelty' or 'interest'. OALib is publishing continuously.

All original papers published by OALib Journal are made freely and permanently accessible online immediately upon publication.

Authors benefit from:

  • High visibility for maximum global exposure with open access publishing model

  • Rigorous peer review of research papers

  • Prompt faster publication with less cost

  • Guaranteed targeted, multidisciplinary audience


How Open is OALib Journal on the "Open Access Spectrum"?

Open Access Library Inc. has signed the Budapest Open Access Initiative and shows its “openness” clearly in the standardized form on the Open Access Spectrum (which is supported by SPARC and OASPA).

Open Access embraces 6 core components related to: 1.) Reader Rights, 2.) Reuse Rights, 3.) Copyrights, 4.) Author Posting Rights, 5.) Automatic Posting, and 6.) Machine Readability.

OALib Journal tries to be as open as practically possible on all 6 Open Access components:

1.) OALib Journal is fully open on Reader Rights.

2.) OALib Journal is fully open on Reuse Rights by granting a Creative Commons License Attribution (CC BY). For authors who want to be more protective, OALib offers only on special request the Creative Commons License Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC) as an alternative. Also this license fulfills OASPA Standards on Reuse Rights. Original copyright and reuse rights are indicated on the paper depending on the author-selected CC license as: "Copyright © 2014 by author(s) and Open Access Library Inc." together with icon or .

3.) OALib asks the authors to grant Open Access Library Inc. a nonexclusive copyright. In this way authors of OALib Journal continue to hold the copyright with no restrictions. This makes OALib a fully open publisher in this component.

4.) Only the authors hold the copyright for their manuscripts before peer review (“preprints”) and after peer review (“postprints”). For this reason, authors are allowed to post their raw manuscripts on any repository or website. OALib does not ask authors to waive this right. Once the manuscript is accepted for publication (after peer review), authors grant Open Access Library Inc. a nonexclusive copyright (see 3.). Based on this copyright, OALib produces the final paper in the layout of OALib Journal. This version is given to the public (and hence also back to the authors) under the Creative Commons license (see 2). For this reason authors may also publish the final paper on any repository or website with a complete citation for the paper. When linking to their paper, authors should make use of the link that OALib has established with crossref.org. It is a pointer to the full text of the final paper. The URL provides a persistent link that will never break. This link has the form http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/YourPaperNumber.

5.) Articles are made available online directly, without any delay.

6.) OALib strives to make articles from OALib Journal as Machine Readable as possible with current technology. OALib will provide metadata for all articles of OALib Journal to the DOAJ, who will then make the metadata OAI compliant.


Publication Ethics Statement

OALib is committed to maintaining high standards through a rigorous peer review at OALib Journal together with strict ethical policies. Any infringements of professional ethical codes, such as plagiarism, fraudulent use of data, or bogus claims of authorship, should be taken very seriously by the editors, with zero tolerance.

OALib Journal follows the Code of Conduct of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), and follows the COPE Flowcharts for Resolving Cases of Suspected Misconduct.

The submitted manuscript should not have been previously published in any form and must not be currently under consideration for publication elsewhere.


Retraction Policy at OALib Journal

OALib recognizes the importance of the integrity and completeness of the scholarly record. The historic record of published research articles shall remain available and unaltered as far as possible. However, circumstances may arise where a paper got published based on misconduct or honest error. It may become necessary to correct the scholarly record in the most appropriate form:

  • Expression of Concern

  • Correction (Erratum or Corrigendum)

  • Retraction

  • Removal

Guiding principles for these measures are COPE's Retraction Guidelines and other accepted scholarly principles. The responsibility of correcting the records is with the editor of OALib Journal.


Contact us

For submission inquiries, please contact [email protected]

For Open Access Library indexing service, please contact [email protected]