Open access supports scientific advancement.
Open access (OA) publishing allows wider knowledge dissemination, removes reading restrictions in its gold form, and offers more opportunities for researchers to improve the visibility of their work and build a strong reputation.
Because of this, science can progress faster. This is good for everyone.
An open future calls.
How will you answer?
Inclusive OA publishing
Any transition to open access publishing should be smooth, fair and sustainable, with no compromise to quality, or to ethical standards.
Those of you who already publish with us will know the benefits that come from choosing our journals.
Publishing open access includes them all.



- We apply the high standards you’ve come to expect from all of our journals with the same to rigorous and fair peer review.
- In their first year, articles published OA typically receive more downloads, meaning increased reach, and a boost to citation potential when your research is at its most relevant.
- Article submission is a clear, simple process that shows you relevant payment and licensing options (including APCs with built-in industry standard CC-BY licences). You also keep the copyright as standard.
- Our APCs are among the lowest in our industry, and we also offer a range of waiver and discount options – including one that means you pay nothing at all to publish your work.
All of this means that you can trust our journals to be a source of reliable, quality research, which accurately represents global progress in a wide range of fields.
How do you feel about Plan S and open access?
The open access landscape is changing fast, and there are many questions still to be answered about its future. We want to make sure that we’re doing all we can to make sure that this future is sustainable, secure and inclusive.
You may know that a group of research funders are proposing a set of 10 principles that they hope will make all publicly-funded research openly available – their plan is called Plan S.
How will Plan S affect the chemistry community? We need to know what you think so that we can effectively advocate for your needs.
On Friday 31 May 2020 we hosted a debate on recent Plan S updates. The panel discussion revealed that while many agree that Plan S is a move in the right direction, there is significant potential for unintended consequences.
Watch the full 45 minute panel discussion below:
Free to read, free to publish in
Chemical Science has a worldwide impact. This platform is home to cutting-edge research which ignites curiosity, development, and progress. As a diamond open access journal, every article is free to read and cite by people all around the world.
This also means that you can publish in Chemical Science for free. We pay for the article processing charges (APCs) and your papers are available for anyone to access around the globe. It is now possible to submit your manuscript in less than 20 minutes because of our new and improved submissions systems. So, what are you waiting for? Let’s get your research out there.
Choose to publish in any of the following gold, fully open access journals
Digital Discovery
- Gold open access journal covering the application of machine learning to solve scientific problems.
- Home to ground-breaking computational research from the areas of chemistry, biology, physics, and materials and biomedical sciences.
- A full APC waiver makes it free to publish in until mid-2024.
Energy Advances
- Gold open access journal publishing across the breadth of energy science.
- Welcoming research from all related disciplines, including energy storage, materials science, policy, technology, digital materials and beyond.
- A full APC waiver makes it free to publish in until mid-2024.
EES Catalysis
- Gold open access journal publishing impactful catalysis advances for energy and environmental science.
- Welcoming multidisciplinary research from across chemistry, materials science and engineering.
- A full APC waiver makes it free to publish in until mid-2025.
Environmental Science: Advances
- Gold Open Access journal publishing quality research across all areas of the environmental sciences.
- The journal is a part of the Environmental Science journals portfolio.
- A full APC waiver makes it free to publish in until mid-2024.
Environmental Science: Atmospheres
- Gold Open Access journal that links fundamental and applied atmospheric science.
- The journal is a part of the Environmental Science journals portfolio.
- A full APC waiver makes it free to publish in until mid-2023.
Materials Advances
- An international, gold open access journal, publishing good quality research across the breadth of materials science.
- The journal builds on and complements the materials research published in the Royal Society of Chemistry journal portfolio.
- Full APCs waivered making it free to publish until 1st July 2022.
Nanoscale Advances
- Launched as gold OA in 2018, Nanoscale Advances publishes research across the breadth of nanoscience and nanotechnology.
- The home of accessible, field-advancing work with global reach.
- A shared editorial board with Nanoscale allows smooth article transfers and a consistent assessment process.
- Visit the journal homepage to learn more about our APCs.
Royal Society Open Science
- Published in collaboration with the Royal Society, the journal covers science, engineering and mathematics.
- We manage the editorial process for all chemistry articles.
- Fast, high quality, and gold open access.
RSC Advances
- One of the largest open access chemistry journals in the world
- At the heart of open access for the global chemistry community
- Led by active researchers, RSC Advances publishes quality work from scientists at every career stage, and from all countries
- One of the lowest APCs in Chemistry, with discounts available for members and Read & Publish authors
RSC Chemical Biology
- Gold open access journal, dedicated to publishing exceptionally significant and breakthrough findings of interest to the chemical biology community.
- Visit the journal homepage to learn more about our APCs.
- A new forum for agenda-setting research with global visibility.
RSC Sustainability
- Gold open access journal publishing impactful research on sustainable chemistry and related fields.
- Welcoming high quality studies from throughout sustainable chemistry and engineering, inclusive of sustainable resources, catalysis, clean synthesis and applied research.
- A full APC waiver makes it free to publish in until mid-2025.
Sensors & Diagnostics
- Gold open access journal publishing high quality and innovative sensing work.
- Covering physical, chemical and bio sensors as well as sensor devices.
- A full APC waiver makes it free to publish in until mid-2024.
Sustainable Food Technology
- Gold open access journal publishing sustainable approaches to food processing and engineering.
- Welcoming novel approaches to food preservation methods, enhancing food quality, sustainable packaging and food product alternatives.
- A full APC waiver makes it free to publish in until mid-2025.
A recognised stepping stone to open access
When an institution signs up for this scheme, authors based there can publish gold open access in any of our hybrid journals as part of the agreement.
It also gives the institution perpetual access rights to content from our entire journal portfolio, and supports the sustainable transition to open access publishing.
1. Author submits a paper
2. Paper is accepted (after the peer-review process)
3. We recognise corresponding authors by email domain
4. We let the author know they can publish OA via their institutions Read & Publish agreement
5. Author completes a licence
6. Paper is published OA
7. Monthly and annual reports are provided to each institution showing the number of articles counted against the agreement
Share your work before it’s published
ChemRxiv™ is the free submission, distribution and archive service for unpublished preprints in chemistry and related areas.
Driven by the chemical science research community, you can use the server to rapidly share your work with a global, interdisciplinary audience, and share and discover the very latest findings.
ChemRxiv is co-owned by the American Chemical Society (ACS), German Chemical Society (GDCh) and the Royal Society of Chemistry.
Visit ChemRxiv
Customer Services team
- Tel:
- +44 (0) 1223 432176
- Email:
- Send us an email