Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology APC and Open Access: No Publication Fee on Biology's Top Review Journal

Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology operates differently from standard research journals. Understanding this model is essential before thinking about costs:

How it works:

1. Editors track developments across molecular and cell biology

1. When a topic is ripe for a review, they identify the leading expert (or experts)

1. The editor contacts the researcher with a formal invitation to write a review

1. Author and editor agree on scope and length

1. The invited author writes the review, which then goes through editorial and peer review

1. Accepted reviews are published

What this means for the APC:

• Every Nature Reviews article is published through the subscription route, with no publication fee

• There is no gold open access option to choose, because the journal does not offer one

• The vast majority of funders with open access mandates only require primary research they funded to be open access, according to the journal, so check your own funder's mandate

• Authors can self-archive the accepted manuscript six months after online publication

Can you submit unsolicited proposals? Yes, for Review-type and Comment-type articles. Proposals go through the journal's online submission system as a synopsis (a 200-word abstract, a brief description of the main sections, a list of key references, and the authors with their affiliations). The journal publishes no acceptance rate for proposals. Its own Reviews & Analysis listing shows 49 items for 2025, and most of its content is commissioned.

Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology has a 2025 Journal Impact Factor of approximately 80-82 in the 2026 JCR release. This makes it one of the five or six highest-impact journals in the world, alongside Nature Reviews Cancer, CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians, and a few others.

Three structural factors explain this extraordinary IF:

1. Review articles are citation magnets. Reviews synthesize and cite entire fields. Other researchers cite reviews when they need a reference for established knowledge. A well-written review in NRMCB gets cited hundreds or thousands of times.

1. Small article count. With only about 49 review-type items a year (the journal's own Reviews & Analysis listing shows 49 for 2025), the denominator in the IF calculation is small. Each highly cited article has a large impact on the average.

1. Invited authors are field leaders. When a Nobel laureate or a member of the National Academy writes about their area of expertise, the resulting review carries authority that drives citations.

The IF of ~80 doesn't mean the journal is "better" than Nature (IF ~56.1) or Cell (IF ~45.1). It reflects the review journal model: fewer articles, each one covering an entire subfield, written by the most-cited people in that subfield. It's a structural artifact as much as a quality signal.

Read & Publish agreements are about open access fees. Because Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology has no APC and offers no immediate gold open access option, there is no open access fee for such an agreement to cover for this journal.

If your institution has a Springer Nature agreement, ask your library what it covers; for a Nature Reviews article the route is subscription publication, and the journal's self-archiving terms apply to the accepted manuscript.

Because the journal charges no publication fee, there is nothing to waive or discount for authors at Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology.

The journal says its approach for non-primary content, with subscription publication and self-archiving of the accepted manuscript six months after online publication, allows authors to comply with the majority of funders' open access policies and mandates worldwide, and it advises authors to check their individual funding mandates before proceeding. It does not name specific funders, so confirm the requirements of your own funder (for example Plan S, NIH, UKRI, ERC, Wellcome Trust or HHMI) directly.

The accepted manuscript can be self-archived on a personal website and in funder or institutional repositories, but the published PDF or HTML version cannot be self-archived.

Being invited to write for Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology is a significant career milestone. It means the editorial team considers you a leading voice in your subfield. A few things to know:

• The commitment is substantial. The journal publishes no standard writing period, so agree the schedule with your editor. The editors expect thorough, authoritative coverage.

• Length is agreed with your editor. The journal's format guide sets no word limit for a Review and asks authors to follow the word count agreed with the editor, with up to seven display items (tables, figures and boxes).

• The editorial process is hands-on. Nature Reviews editors are deeply involved in structuring, editing, and refining the manuscript. This is different from the light-touch editing at most journals.

• Figures are professionally produced. Springer Nature's art team creates publication-quality figures based on the author's sketches and data. This is a genuine perk that saves significant time.

• You can negotiate scope. If the editor's initial proposal doesn't match what you want to write, it's normal to discuss and adjust the topic, angle, or coverage.

For most cell and molecular biologists, Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology is aspirational. Most content is invited, and proposals for Review-type and Comment-type articles are welcome. There is no APC to plan for. Your situation is usually one of these:

1. You've been invited and your funder requires immediate OA. The journal offers no immediate gold open access option, and it says the vast majority of funders with open access mandates only require primary research they funded to be open access. Check your funder's mandate against the journal's self-archiving terms before agreeing to write.

1. You've been invited and have no OA mandate. Publish through the subscription route, which carries no publication fee.

1. You're hoping to publish here someday. Focus on building a publication record in high-quality primary research journals like Nature Cell Biology, Molecular Cell, or EMBO Journal. The invitation comes when editors notice your body of work.

Whether you're writing an invited review or an original research article for any molecular biology journal, preparation matters. Even the most established researchers benefit from a second pair of eyes on methodology, statistics, and structure. Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology submission readiness check to polish your manuscript before it reaches editors and reviewers.

There is no APC to weigh, because the journal offers no immediate gold open access option and charges no publication fee.

What the journal offers instead:

• Publication through the subscription route at no author fee

• Self-archiving of the accepted manuscript on a personal website or in funder or institutional repositories six months after online publication

Check before you agree to write if:

• Your funder mandates immediate open access for the work (compare the funder's policy with the journal's publishing model and self-archiving terms)

• Your institution expects a gold open access route (the journal does not offer one)

For a manuscript-specific signal before you submit, run a Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology submission readiness check.

Or see example reports before you finalize.