Making research results openly accessible enables wider dissemination, which benefits research, the scientific system and society at large. It promotes knowledge growth, innovation and competitiveness. In addition, it can contribute to the public's participation, engagement and interest in research and knowledge production.

One of the goals of open access is to strengthen society, for example, through:

• Helping to reduce knowledge gaps globally - Researchers and students have equal opportunities to read, use and build upon research, regardless of where in the world they are.
• Strengthening education - Pupils, students and teachers have open access to current, relevant research results.
• Broadening the knowledge base and enabling evidence-based decisions - Policy- and decision-makers have access to the latest research in areas such as the environment, education and health.
• Meeting the demands for innovation and efficiency in a knowledge economy - Business and industry have access to the latest research findings.
• Contributing to a sustainable future - Open access to research on the environment, climate, sustainable energy and biodiversity supports the work of environmental organisations, policy-makers and the public.
  
• Enhancing skills and expertise for public sector employees - Healthcare professionals and teachers, for example, can strengthen their competence if they have access to openly available research results. Journalists can also report directly from the source if they have immediate access to research findings.
  
• Improving reproducibility and validation of knowledge - More people can review, test and verify research findings.

FAIR is an internationally recognised concept, and an umbrella term for four guiding principles that support the reuse of research outputs. The principles state that publications, research data and code should be:

• Findable
• Accessible
• Interoperable
• Reusable

For scholarly publications, this means that they should be openly available, easy to find and include information on how they can be reused. This information should be both accessible to people and machine readable.

In 2017, the National Library was commissioned to develop a set of criteria for assessing how well scholarly publications comply with the principles. At the same time, the Swedish Research Council was given a corresponding assignment for research data. KB was also tasked with proposing an assessment method for determining how well scholarly publications and research data meet the FAIR principles.

Read more in the report Scholarly publications and the FAIR Principles External link.

Gold

The researcher publishes in a journal or with a publisher that only publishes open access. The book or article is published with immediate open access on the internet. It is not uncommon for the publisher to charge a publication fee (APC), which is paid by the researcher or their institution.

Green

As soon as permitted by the publisher, the researcher deposits a peer-reviewed and edited version of the article in an online repository. The final version of the article has already been published in a traditional subscription-based journal.

Hybrid

Articles are published in a traditional subscription-based journal but made immediately open access upon payment of a fee.

Diamond

Fees are not charged to researchers or readers. Instead, funding comes from other sources, such as research funders, universities, library consortia, or other public or non-profit actors. Diamond open access aims to offer a non-commercial publishing option that is owned and operated by the academic community, with the goal of promoting fair and equitable scholarly publishing.