Submitting your final eThesis

It is common practice in both in the UK and internationally to make your thesis available to a wide audience by depositing it in an open access repository.  

Please see the Guide to the thesis submission process on the Research student guidance page of the For Students website for more information on the processes explained here.     

All postgraduate researchers (PGRs) must submit their successful thesis for retention in the University Library in White Rose eTheses Online (WREO). The University of Leeds has withdrawn the requirement to submit a hard bound copy of your final, corrected thesis for the award of your degree. You only need to upload your thesis to WREO.   

Following a successful examination, PGRs may have their final thesis proof-read by a third party as part of any corrections to the thesis after the viva. You can read the Postgraduate research proof reading policy and guidance on the Research student guidance page of the For Students website. 

You should only upload your thesis after your internal examiner has approved the correction of any editorial and presentational corrections or minor deficiencies identified at your examination. Please see the University Library website for advice on the upload process. You will not be able to make any changes to the uploaded file, so make sure you are uploading the correct version that has been approved by your internal examiner. 

Deadlines for submission of the eThesis are as follows: 

  • If the award of the degree was made without corrections, your eThesis must be submitted no later than one month after the viva examination.   

  • If you have made editorial and presentational corrections or minor deficiencies, the deadline is no later than one month after the corrections are approved.   

Once you've uploaded your eThesis, a confirmation email will be sent to you, your supervisors, and Doctoral College Operations (DCO). Your eThesis will not be made live until after your degree has been awarded and your name has appeared on a pass list. However, if you've placed an embargo on access to your thesis, your eThesis will not go live until after the embargo has expired. Please see the ‘Restricting access to your eThesis’ section further down on this page for more information on embargo arrangements. 

eThesis format 

One complete PDF eThesis file must be supplied as follows: 

  • This must be a single PDF file of the final, corrected thesis approved by your internal examiner for the award of your degree (including all appendices). 

  • On opening the file, the first page accessed should be the title page of the thesis. 

  • The ethesis should be given a standard filename: “Surname_initials_school_degree_year of submission”, eg Smith_ABC_Chemistry_PhD_2020.PDF. 

Please note that the filename will be visible to anyone accessing your eThesis through WREO. For this reason it is important that you follow the filename format given here and do not include other information in the filename (such as your 9 digit student ID number). 

To help ensure longer-term digital preservation of your thesis, it is strongly recommended that you also provide your thesis in its original source file format (eg Word, LaTex). The PDF file is the version of your thesis that will be made live in WREO and accessible by users, after any embargo period has expired.  

If you are a practice-led researcher your eThesis will comprise both the written commentary and the related practice material. You must upload both the written commentary (as a single PDF file) and all the practice material in appropriate electronic files (eg jpeg, mp3) to WREO. Please refer to the practice-led policy for your faculty/school on the Research student guidance page of the For Students website. 

Restricting access to your eThesis

Wherever possible, theses should be made ‘open access’. However, in some cases immediate access to a thesis may not be possible and you might need to add a temporary embargo. Examples include:

  • where the thesis includes confidential or politically sensitive information;
  • where the thesis includes commercially sensitive information;
  • where you are planning to publish part of your thesis.

Access to the full text of your thesis can normally be restricted for one, two, three, or five years. In the case of a patent pending or in other exceptional circumstances, it may be possible to embargo your thesis for longer. If you think this might be necessary, you should consult with your supervisor, and a case must be made by your Director of Postgraduate Research Studies to the Progression and Examinations Group. 

Decisions on whether an embargo is required and how long is appropriate should be taken in consultation with your supervisors. Therefore, before you upload your eThesis you must discuss the retention of thesis arrangements.  

Please see the Guide to the thesis examination process for more detailed information on thesis embargo arrangements. 

Copyright permissions & redacted eTheses 

Please consult the University Library website for further advice on copyrighted material. You are expected to make all reasonable efforts to seek permission to include third party copyright material in the electronic version of your thesis. However, if you've not been able to obtain the permission of the copyright holder, you must prepare two versions of your eThesis: 

  • eThesis 1 - A “complete eThesis” - a single file including the final, corrected content of your thesis (as approved by your examiners). 

  • eThesis 2 – A “redacted eThesis” file with any third-party copyright material redacted and replaced with a statement such as "This image has been removed by the author of this thesis for copyright reasons”. If possible, when removing material from the digital copy, a placeholder should be included to retain the pagination of the original document. 

In all cases, one complete eThesis file must be supplied and held by the University but will not be made available online.