The prevalence and impact of different types of open access articles from China and USA

Compared to the traditional subscription-based business model, Open Access (OA) publishing has many advantages. It can make science accessible to a wider public and expand individual researchers' influence and increase the potential impact of their research. This study covers all articles and reviews published from China and the USA from 2010 to 2019 with the aim of analyzing the prevalence and impact of different types of OA research articles. We find that the USA has a higher percentage of OA publications than China. American OA articles are more frequently in the Green and Bronze types of OA, while China publishes relatively more in Gold journals covered in DOAJ. Regarding citations, hybrid OA publications from American researchers have the highest impact, while the non-OA publications articles have the lowest impact. Green OA publications from Chinese researchers have the highest impact, while those appearing in Gold DOAJ journals have the lowest impact. The differences can be explained by national research evaluation and OA policies.