Also known as Article Publication Charges, these are a new fee system to support open-access publishing.

• The publishing business model is currently "transforming" (see Transformative Agreements).
• It is shifting the responsibility for the costs involved in publication away from a toll or subscription-based model (the library pays publishers for access to the databases) to an open-access model where the publishers are paid APCs before publication and make the materials available to all.
• These fees vary by publisher/journal and are typically paid by authors, their institutions, or their research grants.
• These agreements also typically retain the copyright with the author instead of the publisher.