Self-archiving

Self-archiving is one way to publish openly and take social responsibility for the dissemination of research results. At the University of Helsinki, HELDA serves as an open full text repository and open access publishing platform.
Self-archiving options for researcher

Self-archiving refers to the open access storage of a publication in an organisation’s publication archive in compliance with the terms of the publisher. Most publishers allow the final version of a peer-reviewed manuscript submitted to the publisher, final draft, to be deposited in the organisational repository. In accordance with the University of Helsinki’s principles for open access publishing (2025), researchers affiliated with the University self-archive their scientific articles in the University’s Open Access repository Helda via the research information system TUHAT. 

At the beginning of 2026, the University of Helsinki will use a prior licence model. In accordance with the model, the author has the right to self-archive their article with a peer-reviewed manuscript (Final Draft) simultaneously with the publication of the article under a Creative Commons licence in the publication repository of their organisation.

As a researcher at the University of Helsinki, you can:

  1. Use the library’s self-archiving service. Email the final peer-reviewed manuscript submitted to the publisher to the library: .
  2. Alternatively, you can self-archive your publications yourself to the digital repository Helda through the research information system TUHAT.

We remind the University of Helsinki researchers, if the self-archiving is lacking. The library transfers most of the publications directly from various databases, but not all publications can be harvested from the web. 

If you receive a reminder of a publication that has been submitted for publication on or after 1 January 2026 and you do not wish to follow the prior licence model, please let us know. Also let us know if you wish to obtain a licence for a publication other than CC BY. Service email: .
1. Do you want to use self-archiving service?

University of Helsinki researcher, send author´s accepted manuscript file to be deposited by the library:

Please, attach also publication information (title / number) to come.

We will find out publishing policy and conditions. If you are unsure which version of your publication you are entitled to self-archive, send both the publisher´s pdf and final draft version to us.

  • We will apply the prior licence model to peer-reviewed articles submitted on or after 1 January 2026 (A1-A4). Articles are stored under the CC BY licence immediately after their release.
  • If you do not wish to follow the prior licence model for an article, or you wish to choose a copyright licence other than CC BY, please tell it in your message.
  • If you have research funding from the Research Council of Finland (from 2021 onward), please include this information in to your message.
  • You can submit parts of your publication, e.g., text, images and tables, as separate files for archiving.
  • Concerning subject specific repositories such as arXiv, we ask you to send the link to the published version.
2. Do it yourself
  • The version to upload is either the final accepted manuscript (after peer-review, before the publisher’s typesetting) or publisher´s pdf.
  • Save the final draft version (usually AAM), or ask it from the corresponding author.
  • If your article has been approved before 2026 or you do not wish to follow the prior licence model, please self-archive the article in accordance with the publisher’s terms and conditions.
  • If you do not follow the prior licence model for an article, please send an email to: .
  • Check from Open Policy Finder database publishers´ self-archiving policy which version can be self-archived and if there is an embargo period.
  • If the publication is peer-reviewed, also the self-archived version must include the changes made after peer-review.
  • Articles published in open access journals should also be self-archived in the University of Helsinki’s repository to ensure their long-term storage.
  • The University recommends using a current version of the Creative Commons license unless the publisher or funder requires otherwise.

These instructions take notice of alignments for Open Science defined by the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture.

All questions regarding open access publishing, please contact email: . The library can also take care of the self-archiving and check the policies on your behalf.

Guide: (pdf)
Explanations for different versions (publisher´s pdf, post-print, pre-print, proof)

Publisher´s pdf 

Published article, final publisher´s version with the layout

  • Alternative terminology: publisher´s pdf, final published article, publisher's version, Version of Record (Vor)
  • Primarily self-archived version if publisher approves self-archiving into the institutional open access repository.

Post-print

Version of manuscript, improved and corrected by the peer-reviewing. Publisher´s layout and page numbers excluded

  • Alternative terminology: final draft, accepted article, Author's Accepted Manuscript (AAM), author's post-print
  • Secondary option in case the publisher does not approve open access self-archiving of the publisher´s pdf. The most common case.

Pre-print

Manuscript before peer-review

  • Alternative terminology: submitted version, author-submitted article, pre-refereed, author’s draft
  • Usually pre-prints are not deposited to TUHAT

Proof

The version of an accepted manuscript that includes final layout and other specifications from the publisher 

  • Alternative terminology: revised version
  • Proof version is not suitable for self-archiving.

You can check the publishers´ policy from

NB! Citations should always refer to original publications not the self-archived version. If you wish to link to self-arhcived version, use the permanent identifier (URN, handle).
Self-archiving of article-based dissertations

The University of Helsinki’s theses (bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral dissertations) are published openly in the Helda publication archive unless there are reasonable grounds for doing otherwise.

For copyright reasons, often only the summarising report of an article-based thesis is published in the repository. 

However, in the case of article-based doctoral theses, individual articles must be self-archived according to either the prioricence model (1 January 2026 or subsequent articles submitted for publication) or the terms of the publisher (articles approved before 2026 as well as an opt-out procedure in which the prior licence model is not observed). You can save the articles yourself or send them to the self-archiving service: .

You can self-archive the publications (pdf files) yourself to research information system TUHAT or send them to the library´s deposit service (email:).

For theses, the Creative Commons licence CC BY or CC BY-NC-ND is recommended. Please contact to: , if you wish to use the CC BY-NC-ND licence.
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