New report reveals growing international engagement with China’s open access research
Latest regional OA white paper from Springer Nature highlights impact of China’s OA research in shaping science, particularly in the Global South
London | Heidelberg | New York, 13 July 2026
Springer Nature’s latest regional white paper, Open for impact: China’s gold open access1 boosting global innovation and supporting the Global South, shows that, by July 2025, nearly 40% of citations to China’s 2022 gold OA articles now come from outside China. The data in the study shows how open access (OA) is supporting increasing international knowledge sharing and access to research worldwide, particularly among researchers in the Global South2.
The report shows that, by July 2025, China's 2022 gold OA articles generated more than 1.53 million citations from researchers outside China, including more than 742,000 citations from researchers across the Global South. The findings underline the growing international engagement with Chinese research and highlight the role open access can play in supporting the global exchange of knowledge.
Data also shows that3:
- Publishing OA delivers a clear usage and impact advantage, with OA articles published in Springer Nature’s hybrid journals receiving almost twice as many citations and more than four times as many downloads in the Global South as comparable non-OA articles4.
- OA strengthens international collaboration around shared global challenges, with co-authored articles between China and the Global South continuing to grow, while research linked to the UN Sustainable Development Goals, including health, energy, climate and food, remains among the most cited in the Global South.
Arnout Jacobs, President, Greater China, Springer Nature, said: "These findings provide new evidence of how gold OA is increasing the visibility, reach and impact of research from China. Nearly 40% of citations to China's 2022 gold OA articles now come from outside China, while strong engagement from researchers in the Global South demonstrates how OA supports international knowledge sharing, wider access to research and global scientific collaboration.”
The white paper draws on publication and citation data from Dimensions, Altmetric data and other sources to examine the growth, reach and impact of China's gold OA research. The full report can be read here.
1. Gold open access refers to a route to making research outputs openly accessible to all by publishing articles or books open access (OA) on a publisher’s platform. Content published via the gold OA route is accessible immediately on publication and is independent of subscription income.
2. The term ‘Global South’ refers to countries in Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia (excluding Israel, Japan, South Korea, and China), and Oceania (excluding Australia and New Zealand). In the analysis, China is excluded from the Global South to show China’s OA impact in the Global South beyond its own borders.
3. The white paper analysis draws on publication and citation data from Dimensions, Altmetric data, and other sources and focusing primarily on research and review articles published in hybrid and fully OA journals with a corresponding author based in China.
4. A hybrid journal is a subscription journal that offers authors the option to publish open access at the article level. Most of Springer Nature’s subscription-based journals offer this option.
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Felicitas Kalb-Behrendt | External Communications | Springer Nature
felicitas.kalb-behrendt@springernature.com
