License Signing Guide

Need help with license signing? Our PDF guide walks you through it.

Licensing requirements

A signed Author Agreement is required by Wiley for all submitted article types before your article can be published. This policy (i) facilitates, where necessary, protection of the contribution against infringement, libel or plagiarism; (ii) enables efficient processing of licensing and permissions requests in order that the contribution be made available to the fullest extent both directly and through intermediaries, as permitted under the Author Agreement; (iii) enables Wiley to maintain the integrity of a contribution once refereed and accepted for publication by facilitating centralized management of all media forms including linking, reference validation and distribution; and (iv) clarifies rights, obligations, and permitted uses.

In the majority of cases, your article must be accepted first, then you should receive information related to the specific license signing process for the journal to which you have submitted your work, including the contact to whom you should return the signed form (usually through your Author Services dashboard).

If you have co-authors, you must obtain each co-author's consent in writing, authorizing you to enter into an agreement on their behalf. Wiley provides a template letter, if needed, in which the co-author can acknowledge that they agree to the terms of the agreement you are executing.

Authors may share, distribute, or re-use excerpts and/or the entirety of their articles subject to the terms of the agreement executed. Please refer to the agreement you have signed or are required to sign to review the applicable re-use rights and note that they may differ from Wiley’s standard Author Agreements if the journal or copyright holder requires a non-standard form.


Licenses for subscription and open access articles

For subscription articles, you will either transfer copyright to Wiley with a Copyright Transfer Agreement (CTA) or grant Wiley an exclusive license to the copyright with an Exclusive License Agreement (ELA). For open access articles, you will sign an Open Access Agreement with a Creative Commons license that allows you to keep the copyright. You will receive the appropriate license agreement in the time between acceptance of your article and final publication online.


For more information and example licenses, view Licensing Info & FAQs.



Wiley's Self-Archiving Policy

Authors of subscription articles published in Wiley journals are permitted to self-archive the submitted (preprint) version of the article at any time, and may self-archive the accepted (peer-reviewed) version after an embargo period.


Visit our Self-Archiving page to learn more.


Compliance with cOAlition S

Authors who have received funding from a member of cOAlition S can visit our page on compliance with cOAlition S policies to learn more about how they can publish with Wiley.