ORCID + Membership Benefits and Fees
Memberships are for organizations.
If you are a researcher, you will always have access to ORCID for free: all your research information is accessible via your own unique profile, to be used wherever you need it! Learn more.
If you don’t already have an ORCID iD, register for one today.
Not using ORCID at your Organization yet?
Join us!
ORCID membership is open to any organization interested in supporting our work, integrating ORCID metadata with their systems, adding trusted metadata to their researchers’ or users’ ORCID records, or participating in our governance. ORCID has over 1,200 member organizations—both direct and through consortia—including universities and research institutions, publishers and professional associations, funders, facilities, government agencies, service providers, commercial businesses, and other stakeholders in the research ecosystem.
Is your organization non-profit?
ORCID consortia are Communities of Practice. Not only do we offer reduced fees for consortia members, ORCID consortia are communities of practice that can share knowledge and pool resources, resulting in a cost-effective way to help accelerate integration into your systems and maximize the value of ORCID to your organization. Only non-profit organizations are eligible for ORCID consortia membership. If this applies to you, we encourage you to consider joining (or forming) a consortium.
Membership Types: Direct and Consortia
Access Levels
Beyond public access, ORCID offers two levels of access to members: Basic and Premium, with several additional benefits to Consortia members highlighted. Both include access to our Member API (Application Programming Interface), which allows your systems and applications to connect to the ORCID registry, including reading from and writing to individual ORCID records with the record holder’s permission.
The tables below outline the benefits of that we offer with our membership access levels.
| Public Access | Basic Member Access | Premium and Consortium Member Access |
|
|---|---|---|---|
| Number of integrations |  public API credential | member API credential |  member API credentials |
| Additional integrations available for a fee |  | |  |
| Organizational ownership/ administration of API credentials | | | |
| Write Data to ORCID Records | |||
| Add data to ORCID records* | | | |
| Update or delete data you’ve added to a record | | | |
| Access Affiliation Manager to add and update affiliation data | | | (Consortia members only) |
| Read ORCID data | |||
| Use Authenticated iDs in your workflows | | | |
| Search and retrieve public data | | | |
| Access the annual Public Data File | | | |
| Access trusted data* | | | |
| Synchronize with public data file on demand | | | |
| Receive record update notifications | | | |
| Read a summary of data via the /summary endpoint | | | |
| Sign in with ORCID | |||
| Let your users sign in with ORCID. | | | |
| Confirm security level of sign-in | | | |
| Support | |||
| Learn from our Knowledge Base of technical documentation, and tutorials | | | |
| Access use cases, best practices, outreach resources, and sample communications | | | |
| Join the API Users group | | | |
| Get help from our dedicated support team | | | (priority) |
| Onboard with a virtual orientation customized to your organization’s needs | | | |
| Other Benefits | |||
| Experiment in our sandbox test environment | | | |
| Participate in public events hosted by ORCID | | | |
| Participate in working groups and community events | | | |
| Access on-demand Member and Integration Reports | | | |
| Access on-demand affiliation reports | | | |
| Nominate a representative to stand for election to the ORCID Board | | | |
| Vote in annual ORCID Board elections | | | |
| Participate in ORCID member-only events, such as town hall meetings | | | |
| Receive Member Connect Newsletter | | | |
*Subject to permissions granted by iD holders
Membership Administration
| Basic Member | Premium Member | Consortium Member | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Membership Administration | Standard membership application and renewal process | Ability to accommodate specific procurement/legal requirements within predefined framework | Membership administered by Consortium Lead |
| Invoicing | Standard invoicing by email | Ability to adopt specific procurement processes | Invoicing administered by Consortium Lead |
Fees
ORCID relies on organizational membership fees to support our work and ensure that it’s always free for researchers everywhere to obtain and use an ORCID iD. The fees we collect from members are used to sustain and improve the ORCID registry, support the enhancement of our products and services for the benefit of the global research community, and ensure open access to our Public API and annual Public Data File. Learn more about how we set our fees here.
Direct Membership Fees
To encourage maximum participation in ORCID and ensure equitable access to our services, we offer the following discounts:
- Non-profit and government organizations are eligible for a 20% discount on direct membership fees, which are reflected in the table below. An even greater discount is available to organizations who join us via a consortium see below.
- We have a 75% discounted fee available for start-ups and other organizations that have less than US$200,000 in annual revenue in the previous fiscal year. This is our way of supporting new and/or smaller innovative initiatives within the scholarly community.
Eligibility for discounts will be re-evaluated at each membership renewal. Non-profit and small/start-up discounts are not applicable to consortium members.
| Direct Membership | 2025 Annual fee** |
|---|---|
| Basic Access | |
| Commercial organizations | US$ 5,800 |
| Non-profit and government organizations‡ | US$ 4,635 |
| Start-ups and other organizations with less than US$ 200k in annual revenue or funds | US$ 1,445 |
| Premium Access (consortium members automatically have premium access) | |
| Small commercial organization with less than US$ 200M in annual revenue or funds | US$ 11,600 |
| Small non-profit and government organizations with less than US$ 200M in annual revenue or funds ‡ | US$ 9,270 |
| Start-ups and other organizations with less than US$ 200k in annual revenue or funds | US$ 2,895 |
| Large commercial organizations with more than US$ 200M in annual revenue or funds | US$ 28,985 |
| Large non-profit and government organizations with more than US$ 200M in annual revenue or funds ‡ | US$ 23,185 |
| Additional integrations | US$ 3,480 per additional integration |
** Our fees exclude any applicable taxes and are always invoiced in US$. Membership applies to a single legal entity and the revenue/grant/funding of that entity will be used to determine the applicable fee.
‡Non-profit organizations should consider joining ORCID through a consortium and save on annual membership fees.
Consortium Membership Fees
In addition to lower fees and automatic premium access, membership through an existing or newly-established consortium carries the benefits of a community of practice, including a coordinated approach to ORCID implementation, technical and administrative support via your consortium lead organization as well as access to the Affiliation Manager which allows organizations to add affiliation data to their researchers’ ORCID records quickly, without the need for a developer or specialized IT knowledge.
Learn more about ORCID consortia here.
Note that only non-profit and government organizations are eligible for membership through consortia.
The table below shows the fees that we collect from our Consortium lead organizations, however some Consortia may charge separate, additional fees for their services, or apply a different fee structure to their members.
Please visit our Consortia page to see if there’s a consortium in your area that you can join, or if you can initiate the formation of a new consortium.
Membership Equity Program (MEP)
Our Membership Equity Program reduces our already discounted consortia membership fees by an additional:
- 80% for organizations from countries with Lower Income (LIC) economies*
- 50% for organizations from countries with Lower-Middle Income (LMIC) economies*
The Membership Equity Program also lowers the number of member organizations required to form a consortium to three (as opposed to five) for the initial year, ensuring you can start your consortium swiftly.
*as classified by World Bank income classifications.
Consortia Membership Benefits and Fees
| Min members | Annual Fee per Member** | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Small Tier below US$ 10M | Standard Tier US$ 10M - 1B | Large Tier above US$ 1B |
|
| 5 | US$ 3,395 | US$ 6,735 | US$ 9,070 |
| 10 | US$ 2,810 | US$ 5,625 | US$ 7,585 |
| 20 | US$ 2,280 | US$ 4,510 | US$ 6,105 |
| 35 | US$ 1,960 | US$ 3,925 | US$ 5,305 |
| 60 | US$ 1,700 | US$ 3,395 | US$ 4,565 |
| Additional integrations | US$1,125 | US$1,125 | US$ 1,125 |
**Our fees exclude any applicable taxes and are always invoiced in US$. Membership applies to a single legal entity and the revenue/grant funding of that entity will be used to determine the applicable fee. In order to cover operational costs, consortia lead organizations may include additional fees on top of the ORCID fee or apply a different fee structure for their members.
Member Equity Program Consortia Fees & Tiers
Lower Middle Income (LMIC) 50% reduction in fees
| Min members | Total Annual Budget of legal entity | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Small Tier below $10M | Standard Tier $10M – $1B | Large Tier above $1B | |
| 5 | USD$ 1,700 | USD$ 3,370 | USD$ 4,535 |
| 10 | USD$ 1,405 | USD$ 2,815 | USD$ 3,795 |
| 20 | USD$ 1,140 | USD$ 2,255 | USD$ 3,055 |
| 35 | USD$ 980 | USD$ 1,965 | USD$ 2,655 |
| 60 | USD$ 850 | USD $ 1,700 | USD$ 2,285 |
| Additional integrations | USD$ 565 | USD$ 565 | USD$ 565 |
Lower Income (LIC) 80% reduction in fees
| Min members | Total Annual Budget of legal entity | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Small Tier below$10M | Standard Tier $10M – $1B | Large Tier above $1B | |
| 5 | USD$ 680 | USD$ 1,345 | USD$ 1,815 |
| 10 | USD$ 560 | USD$ 1,125 | USD$ 1,515 |
| 20 | USD$ 455 | USD$ 900 | USD$ 1,220 |
| 35 | USD$ 390 | USD$ 785 | USD$ 1,060 |
| 60 | USD$ 340 | USD$ 680 | USD$ 915 |
| Additional integrations | USD $225 | USD $225 | USD $225 |
**Our fees exclude any applicable taxes and are always invoiced in US$. Membership applies to a single legal entity and the revenue/funding of that entity will be used to determine the applicable fee. In order to cover operational costs, consortia lead organizations may include additional fees on top of the ORCID fee or apply a different fee structure for their members.