Subscription Pricing for Hybrid Journals

Our Policy 

Our aim is to act in a fair and responsible way to avoid our customers paying twice for OA content via article charges and subscription costs: so called "double dipping."

We will continually review and refine our pricing to ensure Sage continues to work with the best industry practices and that we maintain transparency around our calculations as well as our publishing service covered by APC’s.

1. Beginning with the 2015 subscription year, Sage globally discounted the subscription rate of journals where more than 5% of articles are published as Sage Choice (hybrid OA).
2. As a result, 56 journals have benefitted from a reduction in their planned price increase since we introduced the global discounting in 2015.
3. This discount to the subscription price is not reversed, even if the proportion of OA content falls in subsequent years.
4. For Hybrid journals in Sage Open Access Agreements: Where the proportion of OA revenue is lower than the proportion of OA content, e.g. as a result of Article Processing Charge (APC) discounts, or local (zero rated) offsetting initiatives offered, we will reduce the subscription price based on revenue rather than content.

How do we calculate the discounts?

1. Our calculations are based on the previous three years of data, using a rolling average to smooth out annual variations. For 2023, we have calculated that there is 1 new title which has been discounted as it has reached the 5% threshold of content published as Sage Choice (hybrid OA) See list below under Newly Discounted Titles.
2. The discount applied to subscription titles will be based primarily on the proportion of content published as hybrid OA. E.g. if 5% of the content is OA, the price will be discounted by 5%.
3. Where the proportion of OA revenue is lower than the proportion of OA content, e.g. as a result of Article Processing Charge (APC) discounts, or local (zero rated) offsetting initiatives offered, we will reduce the subscription price based on revenue rather than content.
4. Sage continues to apply this methodology to all Sage owned journals and we do encourage all society partners, whom we publish journals on behalf of, to adopt this methodology.
5. Journals where there is very low APC OA revenue, low number of articles per year, or low subscription revenue may be excluded.

Newly Discounted Titles for 2023

The list below includes titles which have been newly discounted for 2023 as more than 5% of their articles are published as Sage Choice (Hybrid OA)

Journal of European Social Policy   1.6%

Titles Previously Discounted

The list of 55 titles below have been discounted previously according to the proportion of Gold OA content within them. (see point 2 above)

We only discount further if the proportion of Gold OA content increases. If it doesn’t, the discounted price remains the same. If the proportion decreases from the previous year we do not reverse the discount. This becomes the base price. To provide transparency we have listed all previous discounts (by the most recent year first) for these titles. 

Autism 2.3%

British Journal of Visual Impairment 4%

Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society 3%

Chronic Illness 1% (2017), 11% (2016)

Clinical Child Psychology and Psychiatry 1% (2020), 2% (2019)

Clinical Ethics 1% (2017), 5% (2015), 0.5% (2022)

Clinical Rehabilitation 3% (2018), 6% (2015)

Comparative Political Studies 0.5%

Environment and Planning A+E 1%

Environment and Planning B  1.3%

Environment and Planning C 1%

Environment and Planning D  1.0%

Environment and Urbanization 1% (2017), 3% (2015)

European History Quarterly 2%

European Journal of Criminology        2.5%

European Journal of International Relations 1% 

European Physical Education Review 2.8%

European Urban and Regional Studies 3%

Evaluation 3%

Health: An Interdisciplinary Journal 4%

History of Human Sciences 3%

History of Psychiatry 7%

Home Health Care Management and Practice 5%

International Journal of Artificial Organs, The 5%

International Journal of Discrimination and the Law 3%

International Journal of Robotics Research    1.1%

Journal of Attention Disorders             4.0%

Journal of Biological Rhythms 3%

Journal of Cognitive Engineering and Decision Making 8%

Journal of Contemporary History        0.6%

Journal of Empirical Research on Human Research Ethics 20%

Journal of Endovascular Therapy        4.2%

Journal of Health Psychology 0.9%

Journal of Health Services Research & Policy 7% (2023) 2%

Journal of Material Culture 1%

Journal of Psychopharmacology 3%

Journalism        1.9%

Media, Culture & Society          0.4%

Medical Law International 9%

Multiple Sclerosis Journal 4.3% (2023) 4% (2020), 5% (2015)

Nursing Ethics 1.4%

Palliative Medicine 4.2% (2023) 1% (2020), 3% (2019)

Progress in Human Geography           0.9%

Progress in Physical Geography 1%

Public Understanding of Science         1.9%

Qualitative Health Research 2%

Qualitative Inquiry       1.6%

Qualitative Research 1%

Science, Technology, & Human Values 3.8% (2023) 1% (2020), 2% (2019) 

Social Science Computer Review         2.2%

Social Studies 2%

Statistical Methods in Medical Research 1% (2019), 3% (2018) 2% (2017) 

Structural Health Monitoring 3.7%

The Neuroscientist 3.1% (2023) 1% (2020), 4% (2019) 

Therapeutic Advances in Cardiovascular Disease 3%