Update – 12 January 2026
CAUL and Elsevier have reached an in-principle understanding for a new read and publish agreement commencing in 2026.
The immediate impact for ACU is that there will be minimal or possibly no disruption to Elsevier read and publish services.
Negotiations will continue throughout January, and we will continue to provide timely updates.
Read our latest Library news post – Elsevier in-principle agreement reached
ACU Library, as part of the CAUL (Council of Australasian University Librarians) consortium, has paused negotiations on a new Read and Publish agreement with Elsevier.
Our current agreement ends on 31 December 2025. Some journal access may change from early 2026. We are preparing mitigations and will post updates here.
Impacted Leganto/Canvas reading lists by unit (XLSX, 21KB)
Post Termination Access List for Elsevier journal titles (PDF, 55KB)
We will continue to have access to the journal titles in this document that are published up until 31 December 2025. However, we will not have access to any new content published in these journal titles beyond this date.
Negotiations will continue throughout January, and we will continue to provide timely updates.
Library news post – Elsevier in-principle agreement reached
A new in-principle Elsevier Read and Publisher Agreement for 2026 was endorsed by the CAUL Open Access Negotiation Strategy Committee (COANSC) and CAUL Board on 12 December 2025.
Frequently asked questions added – scroll down to view
We will continue to update the FAQs as more information becomes available.
New file uploaded – Post Termination Access List for Elsevier journal titles (PDF, 55KB)
We will continue to have access to the journal titles in this document that are published up until 31 December 2025. However, we will not have access to any new content published in these journal titles beyond this date.
Library news post – Update: Elsevier Read and Publish Agreement
Negotiations with Elsevier have paused. Mitigation strategies are underway, including audits of Leganto reading lists and Canvas links.
At least half of Elsevier content is expected to remain available due to post‑termination access agreements and via other means such as with alternative subscriptions (for example ClinicalKey), open access sources, document delivery services and other channels. Unavailable content may need to be sourced from other publishers.
CAUL media release – CAUL announces landmark new Taylor & Francis agreement, while pausing negotiations with Elsevier (PDF, 268KB)
In 2026 there will be no Read and Publish agreement with Elsevier, with negotiations pausing between Elsevier and the Council of Australasian University Librarians, which manages this agreement.
Access to:
Access to:
Check the articles that you want to use. Some may still be available through other platforms, open access or institutional repositories.
We will continue to have a current subscription to a subset of journals through our ClinicalKey subscription.
Some journals will also provide archived access to pre-2026 issues.
You may be able to request a copy of the article from another library through our interlibrary loan service for research or personal use.
A version may be freely available through an institutional repository. Adding the Unpaywall extension to your browser will help with finding these versions.
The journal’s website will usually have the Elsevier logo in the upper left hand corner of the screen.
If the article is available through ScienceDirect, it is an Elsevier journal.
Linking through to the article will not provide full text but will instead offer pay per view options.
Please consider using the Unpaywall browser extension or our interlibrary loan service to access a version of the article.
Please check your reading lists as soon as possible. Consider if you need to use that article or can you replace it with an alternative.
Develop your research question and search strategy as you would normally. Screen by title and abstract as you would normally.
At the full text screening stage, you can look for any unavailable Elsevier articles by using the Unpaywall browser extension or requesting an interlibrary loan. Allow extra time for this stage.
You may be able to request a copy of the article from another library through our interlibrary loan service for research or personal use.
A version may be freely available through an institutional repository. Adding the Unpaywall browser extension will help with finding these versions.
You will still be able to access title and abstract details of articles through databases like CINAHL and PubMed, however the access to full text of articles in your search results may be limited.
When you are ready to publish your article, your options for publishing in Elsevier journals may be restricted.
The retrieval quality of your search results should not be impacted as these journals will still be indexed in databases such as CINAHL and PubMed.
However the access to full text of articles in your search results may be limited.
Unpaywall is an extension for your browser that helps you find open access articles in repositories run by universities, governments, and scholarly societies, as well as open content hosted by publishers themselves.
As negotiations have paused between CAUL and Elsevier, it hard to say when access will be restored.
Mendeley’s reference manager (institutional version) was provided as part of the Read and Publish agreement. You can continue to use the free version of Mendeley, however the PDF storage limit is reduced to 2GB, so it is recommended that you back up your PDFs in a different location. The number of references you can add is still unlimited.
You might consider using an alternative reference management tool such as Endnote or Zotero.
There will be no Read and Publish Agreements for Elsevier journals in 2026 to cover the APC (Article Processing Charge) for researchers who wish to publish their articles open access, unless the current situation changes.
You can select a different non-Elsevier Journal that is covered by our other Read and Publish Agreements.
Publish CLOSED ACCESS (paywalled) in an Elsevier journal.
You can still make your work OPEN ACCESS by submitting an Author Accepted Manuscript (AAM) to Research Bank. Find out how to deposit into Research Bank.
Publish open access and pay an APC (Article Processing Charge). Please note the Library does not cover the costs of APCs. APCs can be prohibitively expensive.
Researchers should check the Elsevier journal webpages to find out the cost of the APC for the journal (usually in USD).
If you have published open access already, then it is accessible, and will continue to be accessible after the agreement ceases.
If you published behind a paywall, you can submit your author accepted manuscript to Research Bank, and the Library can make that open access, embargos permitting. Find out how to deposit into Research Bank.
If you choose to publish with Elsevier after 31 December 2025, depositing your manuscript with Research Bank is always an alternative open access pathway.
No. To copy and communicate the PDF of a licensed article to students through Canvas/Leganto requires permission and a licence from the copyright owner.
Once our agreement with Elsevier expires we will no longer have a licence to access their material, and uploading a previously obtained copy will be a copyright infringement.
Find out more at copyright for teachers.