IEEE Access APC and Open Access: The Engineering Megajournal That Undercuts Its Own Society

IEEE Access is 100% gold open access. There is no subscription track, no hybrid option. Every article is published immediately under a CC BY 4.0 license. This makes IEEE Access one of the few IEEE journals that is entirely open access rather than hybrid.

Your options for covering the $1,850:

1. Pay from your grant or personal funds
2. Have your institution cover it through an open access agreement
3. Apply for a developing country waiver (limited availability)

Unlike Springer Nature or PLOS, IEEE doesn't have a massive institutional Read & Publish network. Most IEEE Access APCs are paid directly by authors or their grants.

IEEE's institutional agreement landscape is thinner than Springer Nature's or Elsevier's. However, IEEE has been expanding its open access deals:

The $1,850 price point works in IEEE Access's favor here. Most university open access funds cap at $2,500-$3,000, so IEEE Access fits comfortably. Even without a formal institutional agreement, you can often get the APC covered through your library's discretionary fund.

IEEE's waiver program is more limited than PLOS or Springer Nature's:

Developing country waivers: IEEE offers waivers or discounts for authors in low-income countries, but the program isn't as formalized or automatic as Research4Life-based systems. You need to request the waiver through the IEEE Author Center.

IEEE membership discounts: IEEE members don't get a direct discount on the IEEE Access APC. This is a common misconception. Some other IEEE journals offer member pricing on their hybrid OA options, but IEEE Access has a single flat rate for everyone.

No automatic income-based tiers. Unlike PLOS (which has explicit lower-income country waivers), IEEE evaluates developing country requests individually. Approval isn't guaranteed but is generally given for researchers at institutions in World Bank low-income countries.

IEEE Access launched in 2013 as IEEE's answer to the megajournal trend that PLOS ONE started. It accepts manuscripts across all IEEE fields:

• Electrical engineering
• Computer science and AI
• Communications and networking
• Signal processing
• Power and energy
• Biomedical engineering
• Robotics and automation

The journal's scope is enormous but stays within engineering and technology boundaries. You won't find pure biology or clinical medicine here. It's "multidisciplinary" within the IEEE universe, not across all of science.

IEEE Access publishes around 20,000-25,000 articles per year. In 2024, it was the second-largest journal in the world by article count, behind only Scientific Reports. This volume is both a strength (fast turnaround, high acceptance capacity) and a criticism (some researchers view it as a quantity-over-quality outlet).

The journal's impact factor is 3.4 (2024), which has fluctuated over the years. It peaked at 3.9 in 2020, dropped when Clarivate flagged it for unusual self-citation patterns in 2022, and has since stabilized. IEEE addressed the self-citation issue by tightening editorial policies, and the journal remains fully indexed in all major databases.

IEEE is the world's largest technical professional organization, with over 400,000 members. Publishing in an IEEE journal, even the society's megajournal, carries weight in engineering that no MDPI or Frontiers title can match.

What the IEEE name means:

• Indexed in IEEE Xplore, the primary database for electrical engineering and CS
• Recognized by engineering accreditation bodies worldwide
• Carries weight on CVs for engineering faculty positions
• Respected by industry R&D labs that hire from academia

What it doesn't mean:

• IEEE Access is not IEEE Transactions. The Transactions journals are selective (10-25% acceptance rates) and highly specialized. IEEE Access is the accessible tier.
• An IEEE Access paper doesn't demonstrate the same level of selectivity as IEEE TPAMI or IEEE TSP
• The IF (3.4) is the journal's own, not reflective of IEEE's top journals

For researchers early in their careers or publishing incremental results, IEEE Access offers a legitimate IEEE-branded publication without the 18-month review timelines that some IEEE Transactions impose.

IEEE Access is known for fast turnaround. The journal targets a 4-6 week review cycle from submission to first decision, which is dramatically faster than traditional IEEE Transactions (often 6-12 months).

The review process uses a standard single-blind model. Reviewers can see your identity, but you can't see theirs. Each paper typically gets 3-5 reviewers. The acceptance rate hovers around 30-40%, which is more selective than PLOS ONE (~55%) or Scientific Reports (~57%) but less selective than specialized IEEE journals.

One differentiator: IEEE Access allows authors to suggest the Associate Editor who handles their paper. This doesn't guarantee your choice, but it increases the chance of getting a reviewer who understands your subfield. For highly specialized work, this can reduce the frequency of mismatched reviewers.

As a fully gold OA journal with CC BY licensing, IEEE Access meets every major funder mandate. There's no embargo, no green OA workaround needed. Articles are free immediately upon publication.

For US Department of Energy-funded research, IEEE Access is particularly convenient. DOE has specific requirements for depositing in OSTI, and IEEE's systems handle this integration smoothly.

• No page charges. The $1,850 covers everything, including lengthy papers.
• No color figure fees. All figures are digital and free.
• Overlength charges don't apply. Unlike some IEEE Transactions, IEEE Access doesn't penalize long papers. This is attractive for survey papers or papers with extensive experimental results.
• Tax may apply. VAT or sales tax may be added depending on your jurisdiction.
• IEEE Xplore is included. Your paper is automatically indexed in IEEE Xplore at no additional cost.
• Preprints are allowed. You can post to arXiv or TechRxiv before, during, or after review.

IEEE Access makes sense when:

1. You're publishing in an IEEE field and want the IEEE brand at a low cost
2. Your paper is technically sound but not competitive enough for a selective IEEE Transactions journal
3. Speed matters, and you can't wait 6-12 months for a Transactions review
4. Your grant budget is limited, and $1,850 fits better than $2,850+ at other journals

It's less ideal when:

1. You need a selective, high-IF journal for career advancement (look at IEEE Transactions instead)
2. Your work isn't in an engineering or CS field (choose Scientific Reports or PLOS ONE instead)
3. You want maximum institutional coverage (Springer Nature's agreement network is larger)

For more details on the journal's scope and editorial policies, visit the IEEE Access official page.

Before submitting, make sure your manuscript meets the technical and formatting standards that reviewers check first. Run a free readiness scan to catch issues that lead to desk rejection.