Open Access Publishing

• Authors from participating institutions with submitting corresponding author status publish Open Access articles in more than 2,500 Elsevier journals, including Cell Press and The Lancet journals.

• Participating institutions receive a 20% discount on the list price of Article Processing Charges (APCs) for Elsevier Fully Gold journals and a 15% discount on the list price of Fully Gold Cell Press and The Lancet journals.

Reading access

• Participating institutions receive access rights to almost the entire Elsevier journal portfolio, including the Cell Press and The Lancet titles (see list of journal titles). Access to journal content published during the years of the agreement remains permanently available to the participating institution (perpetual access).

• The contract includes an option to purchase the journal archives. Subject to funding by the DFG, MPDLS gGmbH will acquire perpetual access rights to Elsevier content until 2022 (the so-called "Freedom Collection") for the consortium and all institutions entitled to a national licence, which will ensure that these institutions are connected to existing national licences at no additional cost and independently of participation in the DEAL contract.

Pricing Model

• Paper Charge Model: Participating institutions will pay a Publish and Read Fee (PAR Fee) or an Article Processing Charge (APC), as specified in the contract, for each publication in Elsevier's Core Hybrid and Fully Gold journals by submitting corresponding authors assigned to their institution. All fees incurred will be invoiced to the participating institutions by MPDL Services gGmbH.

• The PAR Fee for publications in Core Hybrid journals is €2,550 net. In the case of a high participation rate (more than 90% of the German publication volume in Elsevier journals in 2022 is covered by the participating institutions), the PAR fee will be reduced by 2% to €2,500 net. In both cases, the PAR fee is subject to an annual increase of 3% from 2025.

• For publications in Cell Press and The Lancet hybrid journals, the APC is €6,450 net. It is subject to an annual increase of 4% from 2025.

• For publications in Elsevier's Fully Gold Open Access journals, the APCs are calculated according to the list prices charged to participating institutions minus the agreed discounts (see above).

The DEAL-Elsevier contract is an opt-in agreement, i.e. the use of the services offered requires the participation of an eligible institution. Authors will therefore only be able to publish Open Access articles in Elsevier journals under the terms of the agreement if their affiliated university or research institution has completed the participation process.

Participation is now open and interested institutions can immediatly register with MPDL Services gGmbH. If your institution is already participating in a DEAL agreement, you will automatically receive your participation documents from MPDL Services gGmbH by the beginning of October at the latest.

Please note that early participation will ensure that your institution still has perpetual access rights to Elsevier's content, including the 2023 volume, and will thus avoid any gaps in perpetual access rights, e.g. in the event of an archive purchase (see above). In addition, early participation by institutions increases the chance of a high initial participation rate from 2024 onwards, which would result in a lower PAR Fee for the consortium as a whole (see above).