Nature Immunology APC and Open Access: How It Stacks Up Against Immunity, JEM, and the Rest

Nature Immunology is a hybrid journal with two publication tracks:

1. Subscription track (default, $0): Your article appears behind the Springer Nature paywall. Institutional subscribers have access. You pay nothing.
2. Gold open access track ($12,850): Your article is immediately free for anyone to read. You or your funder/institution pays the APC.

Immunology is a field where most active researchers have institutional access to the major journals. The subscriber base for Nature Immunology covers essentially every immunology department at a research university. Publishing behind the paywall doesn't mean your paper won't be read.

However, open access matters for reach beyond the core immunology community. If your work has implications for oncology, infectious disease, or autoimmunity, clinicians and researchers in those adjacent fields may not have Nature Immunology in their library's subscription package. OA removes that barrier.

This is where Nature Immunology has a significant edge over its main competitor, Immunity. Springer Nature's Read & Publish network is the largest in academic publishing:

For immunology researchers specifically, this coverage matters because the field is concentrated at major research universities that tend to have Springer Nature agreements. If you're at a UK, German, Dutch, or Swedish university, the $12,850 APC is covered automatically when you choose OA during production.

Contrast this with Immunity (Cell Press/Elsevier). Immunity charges $9,350, but Cell Press titles are excluded from most Elsevier Read & Publish deals. An immunologist at University College London pays $0 for Nature Immunology OA (covered by Jisc) but would need to find $9,350 for Immunity OA. The cheaper journal costs more in practice.

Springer Nature's waiver program applies uniformly across the portfolio:

Automatic waivers:

• Corresponding authors from Research4Life Group A countries receive a full APC waiver. No application needed.
• Group B countries receive an automatic 50% discount.

Case-by-case waivers:

• Available for authors facing genuine financial hardship.
• Request is made at the time of acceptance.
• Editors don't see the waiver application. Editorial and financial decisions are separated.

No AAI or society discounts:

• The American Association of Immunologists (AAI) membership doesn't reduce Nature Immunology's APC. The AAI publishes its own journal (the Journal of Immunology) and doesn't have a discount arrangement with Springer Nature.

The waiver system works well for immunology researchers in Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and other low-income regions where infectious disease immunology is a major research focus. Several important studies on malaria immunity, tuberculosis immunology, and HIV vaccine responses from these regions have been published in Nature Immunology with APC support.

Immunology research is heavily funded by NIH (NIAID in particular), Wellcome Trust, and European funding agencies, all of which mandate some form of public access. Nature Immunology's hybrid model accommodates all of them.

For NIH-funded researchers: publish via the subscription track for free, then deposit the accepted manuscript in PubMed Central after the 6-month embargo. This is the most cost-effective route if your institution doesn't have a Springer Nature deal.

For Wellcome Trust or ERC-funded work: gold OA with CC BY is typically required, and these funders usually cover the APC. Check whether your institution's Read & Publish agreement would cover it first, so the funder's money can be spent elsewhere.

Nature Immunology supports CC BY and CC BY-NC licenses. Plan S mandates CC BY. Don't select CC BY-NC if your funder requires CC BY. Fixing the license after publication is possible but painful.

Nature Immunology doesn't charge page fees, color figure fees, or submission fees. The APC is the only direct publication fee. Adjacent costs to watch:

• Flow cytometry data standards: Nature Immunology requires compliance with the MIFlowCyt reporting standard for flow cytometry experiments. Preparing data files for deposition takes time but no journal fee.
• Reagent availability: The journal requires that all antibodies, cell lines, and reagents be available to other researchers. If you're using custom reagents, you may need to set up material transfer agreements.
• Supplementary data hosting: Springer Nature hosts supplementary files for free. Large single-cell RNA-seq datasets should be deposited in GEO or ArrayExpress (also free for standard sizes).
• Tax: VAT applies in the EU. The effective cost for a German institution paying out of pocket could be $15,000+ with 19% VAT.
• License errors: CC BY-NC doesn't meet Plan S requirements. Getting the wrong license is a common and avoidable mistake.

These two journals dominate immunology publishing, and the choice between them often comes down to three factors beyond science:

Cost in practice: Nature Immunology is cheaper at most European institutions (covered by R&P deals) but more expensive when paying out of pocket ($12,850 vs. $9,350).

Article format: Nature Immunology publishes shorter, more focused papers. Immunity allows longer articles with more extensive supplementary data. If your story needs space to develop, Immunity's format may be a better fit.

Editorial scope: Both cover the full spectrum of immunology, but Nature Immunology leans slightly toward mechanistic discoveries, while Immunity has historically been strong in systems immunology and translational immune studies.

Neither journal is wrong for top-tier immunology. The OA economics, though, clearly favor Nature Immunology for authors at institutions with Springer Nature coverage.

1. Institution has a Springer Nature Read & Publish deal? Choose OA at Nature Immunology. It's covered. This is the straightforward path.
2. No institutional coverage, funder requires OA? Compare the actual cost. If you'd pay out of pocket for either journal, Immunity at $9,350 saves $3,500 over Nature Immunology.
3. NIH-funded, flexible on timing? Publish via subscription for free at either journal. Deposit in PMC after the embargo period.
4. Budget-conscious? JEM (~$4,500) and JI (~$1,500) are excellent alternatives at lower price points.

Before the APC matters, you need to clear the editorial bar. Nature Immunology desk-rejects a large fraction of submissions. The editors want discoveries that change our understanding of how the immune system works, not incremental advances on established pathways. To check whether your paper meets that standard, run a free readiness scan before submitting.

For more on the journal's profile and what it takes to publish here, see our Nature Immunology impact factor analysis. For current APC amounts and guidelines, visit the Nature Immunology author information page.