Since its launch in 2021, Open Research Europe (ORE) has gone from strength to strength. 2024 was another year of success and exciting developments for ORE – providing improved services to authors, readers, and the wider research community.
Since its launch, the Platform has received over 1,000 submissions, almost 800 of which were published and more than 500 articles have passed peer review. This includes over 100 papers from European Research Council-funded projects and over 200 papers from Marie-Sklodowska-Curie Actions.
This blog post highlights the key changes and achievements of Open Research Europe in 2024.
February 2024 – New eligibility criteria
In early 2024, the publishing eligibility in Open Research Europe was expanded, providing new opportunities for researchers to submit their work to the Platform.
When ORE launched, it only supported research from authors funded by the European Commission’s Horizon 2020 Framework program. Later, this was expanded to cover all Horizon Europe-funded researchers. Now, authors funded by any of the 40+ EC programs, European Commission staff, and decentralized and executive agencies can submit their work to Open Research Europe.
Expanding the eligibility criteria allows more EC-funded researchers to contribute their research to Open Research Europe, resulting in a wider variety of publications on the Platform and more equity for authors accessing this publishing service.
Learn more about the eligibility expansion.
May 2024 – Updated peer review process
In May 2024, Open Research Europe updated its peer review model to streamline its submission process for authors. Previously, ORE used an author-led peer review model. This model required authors to suggest suitable reviewers, which could be challenging, especially for early career researchers.
With an editorial-led peer review model, ORE’s in-house editorial team can help find and invite reviewers for authors while keeping the rest of the submission process the same, and authors still have the option to suggest reviewers should they wish to. This change simplifies the submission process for authors and speeds up the post-publication review. Keep reading to see exactly how much this change has sped up publishing on Open Research Europe!
September 2024 – Multilingual abstracts
Language barriers can make it difficult for researchers who aren’t native English speakers to gauge the matter contained in a research paper, and whether it would interest them as a reader.
To help with this, Open Research Europe introduced multilingual abstracts. Authors may now include additional abstracts for their papers in up to four additional languages: Spanish, French, German, or Italian by selecting the “add translation” option on the article submission page. Including additional abstracts in other languages will make it easier for readers with English as a second language to find and understand the research that interests them the most, boosting the discoverability of your research.
View an example of a paper with multilingual abstracts here.
2024 in numbers
In 2024, Open Research Europe reached several important milestones in terms of growth.
This year, a total of 275 articles were published, an increase of 25% from 2023. The most read article was titled, “Getting ready for the European Health Data Space (EHDS): IDERHA’s plan to align with the latest EHDS requirements for the secondary use of health data”. This article received 365 views and was downloaded 68 times.
Since introducing editorial-led peer review, the overall publication time has significantly decreased. On average, using the updated peer review model, the time from submission to publication has been reduced by 168 days, resulting in faster turnaround times for authors.
Meanwhile, ORE’s acceptance rate has increased by 80% thanks to its unbiased editorial policy. This policy ensures that all meaningful research outputs that meet our editorial standards—from Study Protocols and Data Notes to Research Articles with negative/null results—receive the credit and visibility they deserve.
The future of Open Research Europe
Open Journal Systems has been chosen as the technology to underpin the Open Research Europe Platform from 2026 onwards. The team at Open Research Europe has already started working with the team at Open Journal Systems to ensure this transition is smooth.
We are grateful to all the authors and peer reviewers who have contributed to Open Research Europe this year. We look forward to seeing more high-quality research published in 2025 and welcoming even more authors to the Platform.
