The cost of open access

The Real Cost of Open Access: Who Pays and Who Profits?

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Table of Contents

Introduction

Open access was once celebrated as the long-awaited revolution in academic publishing. The pitch was seductive: a world where knowledge is freely available to anyone with an internet connection, where the latest discoveries in medicine, climate science, and social policy are no longer locked behind expensive paywalls. It was meant to democratize information, accelerate discovery, and level the playing field for researchers around the globe. But like all revolutions, the reality is more complicated. Instead of eliminating costs, open access has simply rearranged them. Instead of breaking the grip of publishing giants, it has, in some ways, tightened it.

The conversation about open access has intensified over the last decade, particularly as governments, universities, and researchers grapple with its unintended consequences. Behind the optimistic language of openness lies a thorny question: who is actually paying for this system, and who is profiting the most from it? These questions reveal an uncomfortable truth. While access for readers has undoubtedly improved, the publishing ecosystem remains deeply imbalanced. In fact, the financial and structural realities of open access have created new winners and losers, reshaping the academic landscape in ways that were not originally intended.

The Price Tag of “Free” Access

The word “free” in open access is deceptive. Readers may not need to swipe a credit card to download an article, but someone still has to cover the costs of production. Journals need funding for peer review, editorial work, formatting, hosting platforms, marketing, and archiving. In the traditional subscription system, universities and libraries absorbed these expenses through expensive contracts with publishers. Open access flipped the equation, but it did not erase the bill.

Article processing charges (APCs) became the standard replacement. These fees can vary wildly, ranging from just a few hundred dollars in smaller journals to upwards of $12,000 in high-prestige titles like Nature or Cell. A 2023 analysis estimated the global average APC at about US$2,300 per article. For a well-funded lab in Boston or Oxford, this might come out of a grant budget with little fuss. For an independent scholar in Nairobi, Lima, or a small liberal arts college in the Midwest, it can feel like a financial blockade.

The irony is stark. Open access opens the door for readers but keeps a financial bouncer at the publishing entrance. This has created a two-tiered system where those with resources enjoy full participation while those without are left on the sidelines. The very model designed to increase inclusivity risks deepening global inequalities in research output.

The Business Model Shift

Publishers have been quick to portray open access as an altruistic shift, a way of giving back to the academic community. But strip away the marketing gloss and what remains is a clever reengineering of the cash flow. Instead of charging readers and libraries, publishers charge authors. This ensures they remain profitable while basking in the moral high ground of “openness.”

The numbers tell the story. Elsevier, Springer Nature, and Wiley continue to report profit margins hovering around 30 percent, an astonishing figure for any industry. Elsevier’s parent company, RELX, has consistently posted billions in revenue annually, showing that the transition to open access has not diminished its dominance. On the contrary, it has created a new profit stream.

Hybrid journals, which offer both open and paywalled articles, allow publishers to charge APCs while still collecting subscription fees. Critics call this “double-dipping,” but it remains common practice because universities cannot simply cancel subscriptions without depriving their researchers of access.

In essence, open access has not disrupted the market but reinforced it. The same powerful publishing houses that monopolized subscriptions now monopolize open access, too. They simply control the gate from a different direction. The ones footing the bill are not the publishers but the researchers, institutions, and funders.

The Impact on Researchers

For researchers, especially those early in their careers, the APC model can feel like an academic toll booth. Senior scholars with generous funding streams can easily pay thousands to secure a spot in a prestigious open access journal. At the same time, junior academics struggle to find the money to publish even a single article. The result is a skewed system where visibility is often tied to wealth rather than merit.

This distortion affects not just careers but the trajectory of scholarship itself. Research agendas become shaped by what can be afforded, not just by what is most urgent or innovative. In fields like the humanities, where funding is notoriously scarce, many scholars cannot engage with open access publishing at the same level as their peers in the biomedical sciences. The result is unequal representation across disciplines and geographies.

Moreover, the prestige economy of academia still favors high-impact journals, most of which charge the steepest APCs. A postdoctoral researcher in South Africa or Indonesia might have groundbreaking insights but lack the budget to place them in top-tier outlets. Meanwhile, a well-funded lab in Europe can churn out a steady stream of articles in those very journals, cementing its global visibility. Open access thus risks entrenching hierarchies it was meant to dismantle.

Libraries and Institutions: Still Paying the Bill

Libraries were once the frontline victims of soaring subscription fees, and many thought open access would relieve them. Instead, they now find themselves negotiating massive “transformative agreements” or “read-and-publish” deals with publishers. These contracts allow their researchers to publish open access while still retaining subscription access to journals, but the costs are often staggering.

For example, in 2021, the University of California reached a landmark transformative agreement with Elsevier, valued at tens of millions of dollars annually, to cover both subscription access and APCs. European consortia have signed similarly expensive contracts. These agreements may appear progressive, but they lock institutions into the same reliance on publishing giants, only with the financial burden rebranded.

Smaller universities and colleges fare far worse. Without the leverage or budget to negotiate such deals, their researchers often must pay APCs out of pocket. Thus, open access creates a hierarchy not just between wealthy and underfunded countries but between well-endowed and modest institutions within the same country.

The Global South: A Double Burden

Nowhere are the contradictions of open access more visible than in the Global South. In countries where subscription fees were already prohibitive, open access promised a lifeline. Indeed, more researchers now have access to the latest scholarship than ever before. Yet when it comes to contributing their own work, many are blocked by APCs that far exceed local research budgets.

This creates a paradox: scholars can read but not publish. Their contributions to global knowledge remain muted, reinforcing long-standing imbalances. A Brazilian or Kenyan scholar may now freely access cutting-edge research on public health, but publishing their own study in a high-profile open access outlet could cost as much as a year’s salary.

Alternative models in Latin America, such as SciELO and Redalyc, demonstrate that it does not have to be this way. These community-driven, publicly funded platforms allow open access without charging authors. But while they thrive regionally, they lack the international prestige of major commercial publishers. As long as academic hiring and promotion hinge on metrics tied to big-name journals, Global South initiatives will remain sidelined in the global prestige economy.

The Role of Funders and Governments

Funders and governments sit at the heart of the open access puzzle. Policies like Plan S, launched by European funders, mandate that all publicly funded research be published in open access venues. While well-intentioned, such mandates often steer researchers directly into APC-driven journals, effectively channeling public funds into the coffers of large commercial publishers.

Some governments have experimented with covering APCs through central funds, while others have pushed for the creation of national repositories where researchers can deposit their work for free. Yet these efforts remain uneven. In countries with weaker research infrastructures, scholars are left to cover the costs themselves. The result is a global patchwork where some researchers are fully supported while others are left stranded.

If governments and funders want open access to live up to their ideals, they must go beyond subsidizing APCs. Investing in alternative infrastructures—such as institutional repositories, national platforms, and non-profit publishing models—could help shift the balance of power away from commercial giants.

Alternatives and the Future of Open Access

Not all open access models are built on APCs, and this is where the conversation about the future should focus. Diamond open access, in which neither authors nor readers pay, is gaining traction. It relies on funding from governments, universities, or consortia, rather than individuals. Preprint servers like arXiv, bioRxiv, and SocArXiv also continue to grow, offering free dissemination of work outside the constraints of journal publishing.

The challenge is cultural as much as financial. Academic prestige is still closely tied to established journals, many of which are controlled by commercial publishers. Until hiring committees, funding bodies, and tenure boards start valuing alternative forms of dissemination, scholars will feel compelled to pay steep APCs to secure a foothold in the existing hierarchy.

That said, there are encouraging signs of change. Initiatives in open science, open peer review, and public repositories are slowly challenging the dominance of the traditional journal. If funders, institutions, and scholars collectively push toward these alternatives, the open access system may one day reflect its original promise: a truly equitable model of knowledge sharing.

Conclusion

Open access has undeniably made research more accessible, but it has not solved the underlying problems of academic publishing. Instead, it has reshaped them. Readers now benefit, but researchers, institutions, and governments shoulder the financial burden. Meanwhile, major publishers remain the biggest beneficiaries, proving once again that they are masters at monetizing knowledge.

The real cost of open access is more than a dollar figure. It lies in who gets to publish, whose voices dominate the scholarly conversation, and whose contributions remain sidelined. If academia is serious about democratizing knowledge, it cannot simply rely on APCs as the default solution. It must invest in alternative infrastructures that reduce inequities rather than reinforce them. Otherwise, the lofty ideals of open access risk becoming little more than a branding exercise, with profits flowing to the same familiar players.

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