NIH Public Access Policy

Compliance

• A PubMed Central reference number (PMCID) is required to demonstrate policy compliance. 
• Beginning July 1, 2025, the policy mandates that the author's accepted manuscript (AAM) be submitted to PubMed Central immediately upon acceptance for publication (i.e., informally, that window of time between AAM acceptance and the publication of the final published article).
• Beginning July 1, 2025, the policy removes the previous 12-month embargo period for public access to manuscripts of NIH-funded research.

Enforcement

• Compliance with the NIH Public Access Policy is an institutional responsibility. 
• Failure to provide evidence of compliance with the policy in an application, proposal or report is a violation of the terms and conditions of the NIH award. 
• Noncompliance with the policy may be considered by NIH regarding future funding decisions for the recipient institution. 
• Non-competing continuation grant awards are subject to a delay in award processing for noncompliance with the policy.

Principal investigators with eRA Commons accounts will use the My NCBI My Bibliography tool to manage and populate their professional bibliographies. PIs must have a MyNCBI account in order to access My Bibliography and the account must be linked with an eRA Commons account. PIs may designate a delegate to maintain My Bibliography content on their behalf.

• General My Bibliography help.
• Using My Bibliography to manage NIH Policy compliance.
• Link eRA Commons and My NCBI accounts.
• Assign a delegate to manage My Bibliography.