Repositories

If you run a repository, OpenAlex is probably already harvesting it, and there’s a lot you can do to make your records show up more completely and accurately. This page is the recipes. The mechanism (how harvesting, matching, and full-text detection actually work) lives in the Repositories reference.

Two words to keep straight: your endpoint is the OAI-PMH URL you run, and your source is the OpenAlex record we mint for your repository (openalex.org/sources/S…). You own the endpoint; we own the source. Fixes happen at the endpoint; results show up on the source.

Everything on this page ends the same way: if what you see doesn’t explain itself, file a support ticket and we’ll take it from there. There’s no form to fill in and no validator to run.

How do I get my repository harvested by OpenAlex?

First, check whether we already harvest you. Search our repository sources for your repository’s name. If it’s there, open it and click the Harvest tab: it shows the endpoint we have on file and when we last received records from it. If the endpoint is right and the status is healthy, you’re in, and we’ll keep checking you daily.

If you’re not listed, or the tab says we have no endpoint on file, email support@openalex.org (or use openalex.org/contact) with:

Subject: Add my repository

Repository name: 
OAI-PMH endpoint URL: https://…/oai (the base URL, not your homepage)
Set (only if the endpoint serves several collections): 
Three or four example DOIs of open-access articles in the repository: 

That’s the whole registration. We verify the endpoint, add it, and reply. If we need something else (a set name, a metadata prefix, an allowlist entry on your side) we’ll ask; you don’t need to validate anything before writing. Your receipt is the Harvest tab on your new source: once the endpoint is on file it appears there, and the first harvest pulls your whole back catalog, which can take a few days for a large or slow repository.

Running a journal on OJS? A journal belongs in Crossref, not here, but OJS’s built-in OAI-PMH endpoint can also be registered the same way. See Getting indexed for which path fits.

Is my endpoint harvestable?

Most registration failures are the endpoint’s own OAI-PMH quirks, and you can check all of them yourself in a browser before writing to us:

• Give us the OAI-PMH base URL, not your homepage. Test it: https://your-endpoint/oai?verb=Identify should return XML with your repository’s name in it, and …?verb=ListRecords&metadataPrefix=oai_dc should return records. If either returns a web page or an error, that’s not the URL we need. Typical shapes: /oai/request (DSpace), /cgi/oai2 (EPrints), /do/oai/ (Digital Commons), /index.php/<journal>/oai (OJS).
• No login, API key, or IP restriction on the feed. We fetch it anonymously. If you run a firewall or a bot-blocker in front of it, allowlist us.
• A correct earliestDatestamp in your Identify response. We start your first harvest there, and we read its format to decide whether to send dates with or without times. A date in the future or long after your oldest record silently truncates the back catalog.
• Answer within 15 seconds per request. That’s our timeout. If your platform takes longer to warm up from cold, the first request of the day fails and we try again tomorrow. We make at most three requests to any host at once.
• Serve oai_dc. That is the metadata format we read. Records with an empty <metadata> element are skipped, not fatal.
• A DOI and a title in each record, so we can match it. Details in Making your records match better.

If everything above passes and you’re still not harvested, report it; include the Identify URL and we’ll look at the rest.

How do I check OpenAlex’s harvest of my repository?

Open your source on openalex.org and click Harvest (or go straight to https://openalex.org/sources/S<id>?tab=harvest). It is the live record of what we have from you and how the last attempt went. The tab is marked beta; the data is real.

Harvest status. Last new records received is the date we last stored a record we didn’t already have. It only moves when your repository gives us something new, so a stable repository shows an old date and that’s fine. Next harvest counts down to our next daily check.

What we’ve harvested. Three numbers, and they are different on purpose:

• records (locations) harvested from this source: every harvested record that parsed cleanly, one location each. The API icon beside it opens the raw list: api.openalex.org/locations?filter=source_id:S<id>. This is the number to compare with your repository’s own record count.
• works include this source as a location: how many works have at least one of your copies attached. Lower than the first number when several of your records describe the same paper.
• works have this source as their primary location: works where your copy is the main one, which usually means we found no publisher version. Lower still. See Records are not works for why these diverge.

Harvest history. New records received per month since our first harvest. Early bars are large because the first harvests pull the back catalog. There’s a CSV download.

Endpoints on file. The OAI-PMH URL (and set, and metadata prefix) we harvest, with two links: Identify opens your endpoint’s Identify response, and recent records opens the same ListRecords request we send. If those links don’t work in your browser, they don’t work for us either. Under each endpoint is a health line: a green dot and last harvest OK, or a red dot with the status and the error your server returned, verbatim.

If the tab says We don’t have an OAI-PMH endpoint on file for this source, we know the repository (usually from records that arrived some other way) but aren’t harvesting it: register the endpoint.

What does my endpoint’s harvest status mean?

The health line under each endpoint shows one of six statuses from our last attempt. The error text next to it is whatever your server or the protocol library said, unedited. We retry every failing endpoint the next day, so a fix on your side needs no re-registration; just watch the line turn green.

Anything else, or a status that stays red after you’ve fixed the cause, is a ticket: report it with the status and the error text.

Why are only some of my repository’s records showing up?

Because a repository record isn’t an OpenAlex work. When your record matches a paper we already know (from Crossref, DataCite, PubMed, another repository), it becomes a location on that existing work rather than a new work of its own. Your source’s work count is therefore the number of works that have you as a location, never a mirror of your record count. The full explanation is Records are not works in the reference.

Matching also depends on metadata: records without a cleanly reported DOI, or a matchable title and first author, can fail to match, and a record whose only DOI is one your repository minted looks like a different paper to us. See Why a repository seems to be missing most of its works.

To see exactly what we hold from you, use the records (locations) count on your Harvest tab and its API link: api.openalex.org/locations?filter=source_id:S<id>. Every record we harvested and kept is there, whether or not it matched.

How do I see my repository’s unmatched records?

Unmatched repository records aren’t gone. Any record with a DOI or a usable title is minted as a work of its own, with your repository as its only source, and it sits in the core corpus like any other work. The exception is the backlog swept in at the November 2025 Walden cutover: those were minted into the expansion corpus, which is excluded from API results by default. To include them, add corpus=all to your query:

api.openalex.org/works?filter=locations.source.id:S4306402521&corpus=all

For many repositories this changes the count dramatically. (Data quality in the expansion corpus is lower on average and improving.)

Why did my repository’s work count go down?

Usually because coverage got better, not worse. A work counts toward works have this source as their primary location only while your copy is the main one. When we later find the publisher’s version of record, your copy stays on the work as its green-OA location but stops being primary, and the primary count drops. Nothing was removed. Compare the two queries:

api.openalex.org/works?filter=locations.source.id:S<id>          # every work with your copy
api.openalex.org/works?filter=primary_location.source.id:S<id>   # works where your copy is primary

If the first number dropped, or the records (locations) count on your Harvest tab did, that’s a real loss and we want to hear about it: report it with both numbers and the date you noticed.

We changed platforms or our endpoint URL moved

Email us the old URL and the new one (plus a set name, if the new endpoint needs one), and we’ll swap it on your source. Until we do, your Harvest tab will show the old endpoint going red with connection_error; after the swap, the next daily run picks up from where the old one stopped. Platform migrations often restamp every record’s datestamp, which makes your whole catalog look new to us: that’s fine, we re-fetch it and dedupe against what we already have. Watch the Harvest tab for the first green line on the new endpoint.

How do I allowlist OpenAlex’s harvester?

Our OAI-PMH harvester runs from a single static IP address and identifies itself in every request:

IP address:  18.213.181.255
User-Agent:  OpenAlexHarvester/1.0 (+https://help.openalex.org/how-to/repositories/; mailto:support@openalex.org)

Allowlist the IP, or the User-Agent, or both. This applies to OAI-PMH harvesting only. Fetching landing pages and PDFs to find full text uses rotating addresses we can’t promise, and blocking those costs you open-access detection, so don’t restrict it to the IP above. When we first verify a newly registered endpoint we may probe it once from a different address with a User-Agent that also starts with OpenAlex; if your firewall logs a block during registration, that’s what it was.

How often do you harvest, and how long until a new deposit shows up?

Daily. One run checks every registered endpoint for records changed since its last successful harvest (re-overlapping by a day so nothing at the boundary is missed). A deposit made today is normally in OpenAlex within a day or two of harvest, once it has been parsed and matched. A newly registered repository’s first run fetches the entire back catalog in one pass; for a large or slow endpoint that can take days. If your Harvest tab’s last new records received date doesn’t move after you deposit, check that the record’s datestamp actually changed: we ask for records by from date, so a deposit stamped in the past isn’t new to us.

How can I make my records match better?

Three metadata habits make the biggest difference:

1. Report DOIs cleanly. A record with the published version’s DOI matches reliably; without one, matching falls back to title + first author. If you also mint your own DOI for a deposit, keep the publisher’s DOI in the record too.
2. Put the license in the record. A dc:rights element with a license URL beats hoping we detect the license from the full text. See License reporting for the exact format.
3. Report the version when you’ve verified it. publishedVersion, acceptedVersion, or submittedVersion in a dc:type element, see Version reporting. This one has funder-compliance stakes: a paper reported as submittedVersion when you hold the accepted manuscript can look non-compliant downstream. If you haven’t verified the version, leave it out and we’ll determine it automatically.

How do I report a repository problem?

Email support@openalex.org or use openalex.org/contact. Before you write, spend two minutes on the Harvest tab: it answers most “are you harvesting us?” questions, and its error text is the first thing we’d ask for.

A report we can act on has five things. The one that matters most is several examples: one record can be a coincidence, five is a pattern we can fix.

Subject: Repository problem: <one line, e.g. "accepted manuscripts showing as submittedVersion">

OpenAlex source: https://openalex.org/sources/S<id>
OAI-PMH endpoint: https://…/oai   (the base URL, not your homepage)
Harvest tab status + error text, if any:

What's wrong: 
What we expected: 

Examples (3–5, ideally both a case that works and cases that don't):
  https://openalex.org/W…   DOI 10.…   OAI record id oai:…   what's wrong with this one
  …

If it's about counts: which number, from where, and what you expected instead.

Paste evidence into the message rather than attaching a screenshot; we read the text, and links we can click are worth more than pictures of them. If a record is wrong in OpenAlex but right in your repository, say so, and include the OAI record identifier so we can look at what your endpoint served us.

Things to check first, because they’re the usual answers:

• Is it a count question? Read why only some records show up and why the count went down.
• Is it an OA status or license question on a specific work? That’s a data-error report, not a harvest problem: see How do I fix a work’s open-access status?. Check the PDF is reachable from outside your campus network first.
• Is it a harvest failure? The status table above says what each one means and what fixes it.

Whatever it is, if it isn’t explained by the time you’ve looked, write to us. We’d rather read a ticket than have you guess.