The next Research Excellence Framework will be REF 2029. The University Research and Enterprise REF Guidance pages contain institution wide REF information. This page focusses upon the REF Open Access policy.
Some policies and guidance are now being published. The latest Open Access policy was published in December 2024.
The key message remains the same : Deposit the Author Accepted Manuscript on Acceptance.
The implementation date for the changes in the policy is 1 January 2026. Outputs published before 1 January 2026 should continue to comply with the existing REF OA policy.
Journal articles and conference proceedings with an ISSN are all still in scope. No other form of output is in scope.
There will be no longform output Open Access mandate for REF 2029.
Acceptable embargo periods for journal articles will be reduced to 6 months for panels A & B and 12 months for panels C & D.
The changes to the policy should mean as long as you continue to deposit author accepted manuscripts of journal articles and conference proceedings with an ISSN in Symplectic on acceptance you should continue to be compliant.
The Research Services team process these records and make outputs available Open Access in the Leeds Beckett Repository, within either our Rights Retention policy or where that does not apply, within publisher rules.
Final full REF guidance is expected to be published in 2026.
