PhD theses

The legal deposit was established on 28 December 1537 in Montpellier by François 1er, through an ordinance requiring every printer or publisher in the kingdom of France to submit a copy of each book they produced to the King’s Library, to preserve "all works worthy of being seen that have been or will be created, so that they may be referred to if they are lost from human memory." (Opens a new window) Visit the BnF website for more information.

Today, the legal deposit is enshrined in the (Opens a new window) French Heritage Code. It is the obligation for every publisher, printer, producer, or importer to deposit each document they publish, print, produce, or import with the authorized body, depending on the nature of the document.

For PhD theses, the authorized bodies are universities and institutions accredited to award PhDs. The legal deposit of theses is carried out by authorized personnel from university libraries or scientific information services.

The legal deposit of PhD theses is mandatory, even for confidential theses, and is a condition for awarding the PhD degree.

It ensures the long-term preservation of PhD theses.

The deposit is made digitally, as defined in Articles 24 and 25 of the (Opens a new window) Decree of 25 May 2016 on the national framework for doctoral training.

Excerpts from a id="a1">Article 24 of the Decree of 25 May 2016

"The PhD candidate [...] deposits [their thesis] one month before the scheduled defense date [...].

The defence is conditional on the chair of the examination board receiving from the doctoral service a certificate of thesis deposit [...], including an abstract in French and English, as well as a list of keywords [...].

The award of the PhD degree is conditional on the deposit of the corrected thesis."

Only the head of the defending institution can decide to classify a thesis as confidential. If the thesis is confidential, it cannot be communicated to anyone.

If the thesis is not confidential, it can be disseminated.

In this case, only the author of the thesis is authorized to choose between the following dissemination options:

• Open access on www.theses.fr immediately after the legal deposit is finalized.
• Open access on www.theses.fr after an embargo period.
• Restricted access to the academic community (in the library or on www.theses.fr after authentication).

When the thesis is under embargo or has restricted access, it remains consultable within the institution or on the intranet of the national thesis portal www.theses.fr

The chosen dissemination conditions are formalised in a thesis dissemination contract.

University libraries and scientific information services provide awareness-raising and training to help PhD candidates make informed choices and support them during the first legal deposit of their thesis.

Open access dissemination of a thesis is now considered best practice and is widely encouraged because:

• It makes the results of publicly funded research publicly available.
• Your work will be more visible, downloaded, and cited by other researchers and students.
• Your thesis will have a permanent and validated online address.
• It enhances your recognition within the academic community and beyond.
• PhD theses in open access are analysed by digital data mining tools, making it easier to identify you than with just keywords or the thesis abstract.
• A widely disseminated thesis is better protected against plagiarism than a restricted-access work.
• Download statistics may lead a publisher to propose a publishing project. However, be cautious of companies posing as publishers but offering no real editorial quality work on your thesis text.

You may choose to delay the open access dissemination of your thesis by using an embargo for a limited period.

An embargo can be used to optimise the dissemination of the thesis by revealing it at a strategic time for the general public.

Example: A thesis on the socio-economic impact of the Olympic Games could be embargoed until the official announcement of the host city.

An embargo may also be useful if articles or a book are being published. The thesis can remain under embargo until the articles are published.

At the end of the embargo period, the thesis becomes freely accessible on www.theses.fr.

The proportion of theses made available via open access has risen sharply over the last decade. Just under half of the theses defended in 2010 were open access, whereas around three-quarters of those defended in 2020 were open access.

The open access rate temporarily decreases for the most recent years due to theses still subject to confidentiality or embargo periods. Most become freely accessible after these periods.

(Opens a new window) View the evolution over time

The open access rate varies significantly by discipline:

In astronomy, mathematics, computer science, and earth sciences, open access is almost universal. In law, political science, or literature, the practice is less common (less than 50%).

(Opens a new window) View the data

(Opens a new window) Article 19 of the Decree of 25 May 2016 states:"The defence is public, except in exceptional cases where an exemption is granted by the head of the institution if the thesis topic is demonstrably confidential."

The decision to classify a thesis as confidential is made by the head of the institution if the thesis has a demonstrated confidential nature.

In other words:

• The doctoral candidate or his/her supervisors cannot decide on this confidential classification alone,
• The request generally needs to be justified (e.g., a confidentiality commitment made to human research participants, confidentiality clauses in a collaboration agreement, a patent application in progress, etc.)
• The confidential or non-confidential nature of the thesis precedes its confidential classification. This confidential classification indicates to the relevant services of the university (doctoral school, library) that they must take appropriate measures.

Generally, the confidential nature of the thesis topic and the potential need for confidential classification of the thesis are known and have been declared and justified well before the defense.

The (Opens a new window) individual training agreement must specify whether the topic is confidential. This agreement is established during the first PhD registration and can be modified at each re-registration.

Several reasons justify the exceptional nature of confidential classification:

• The public nature of the PhD defense is a long-standing principle (also applied to marriages, e.g., with the "publication of banns" at the town hall), which increases transparency and informs third parties so that anyone can object by demonstrating potential impediments.
• After legal deposit, the thesis becomes part of the (Opens a new window) public archives and is therefore, except in exceptional cases, communicable to the public.
• Making the thesis and the jury composition accessible aligns with open science principles (returning publicly funded research results to the public, ensuring the reproducibility of scientific results, ensuring the credibility of research in society, etc.).
• It is also important for the recognition of the PhD, as it allows others to know on what basis the degree was awarded and by whom it was validated.
• Finally, classifying a thesis as confidential can seriously hinder a PhD graduate’s job search, as they may need to present their achievements. During the confidentiality period, the thesis cannot be disseminated, reproduced, or communicated by anyone, including the author.

For these reasons, confidential classification is:

• Reserved for information with proven confidential status (sensitive information, technical solutions for which a patent is envisaged, personal data, etc.).
• For a limited duration.
• Decided by the head of the institution (not by the PhD graduate).

If the thesis has been classified as confidential, the defence may, as an exception, be held in camera (behind closed doors)

The confidential classification of the thesis may result from confidentiality commitments made to partners or participants before the work begins, for example, in a collaboration agreement with research partners or in a consent form for human participants in the research, or during data collection.

The confidential classification of the thesis may also be necessary to protect an innovation, particularly when a patent application is being considered.

Finally, the thesis may be confidential because it includes information covered by secrecy laws (e.g., medical confidentiality, privacy, trade secrets).

(Opens a new window) Learn more...

The confidentiality period is always time-limited but depends on the reason for classification and any agreements concluded by the institution:

If confidentiality is justified by a patent application, the period is usually 18 to 24 months (due to patent publication deadlines). If necessary, an extension may be granted.

If confidentiality is intended to protect industrial and commercial secrets or exploitable research results obtained through a public-private partnership (e.g., CIFRE thesis), the confidentiality period is, at most, equal to the period specified in the collaboration agreement signed by the institution (usually 5 years).

For other reasons, the confidentiality period is typically based on the protection periods for sensitive data and documents set out in the (Opens a new window) French Heritage Code.

Example: For a thesis on a historical figure, a 25-year period from the date of the individual’s death must be applied to information whose disclosure would breach medical confidentiality.

If the thesis contains confidential information and no alternative solution (anonymisation, local redaction, etc.) can be found, the following measures must be taken before, during, and after the defence:

• During PhD registration (or during re-registration if the need for confidentiality arises later), the confidential nature of the thesis topic must be indicated in the individual training agreement, signed by the thesis supervisor(s), the PhD candidate, and, if applicable, the head of the host company or organization.
• Individuals who may access confidential information (e.g., during an individual monitoring committee) must also sign a confidentiality agreement with the defending institution.
• Before the defence, the confidential classification of the thesis must be requested from the head of the institution, and this information must be communicated to the service responsible for the legal deposit.
• Before receiving the thesis, reviewers and jury members must sign a confidentiality agreement with the defending institution.
• The transmission methods used when sending the thesis to reviewers, jury members, or documentary services must ensure the thesis’s confidentiality (e.g., encryption).
• A confidential thesis must still be subject to legal deposit by the defending institution, archived at CINES, and listed in Sudoc and theses.fr. Care must be taken to ensure that the publicly disseminated information after legal deposit (title, abstract, keywords) does not contain confidential details.
• The defence will generally be held "in camera" (behind closed-doors), with only those who have signed a confidentiality agreement, convention, or undertaking with the defending institution in attendance.
• After the defense, a thesis under a confidentiality clause cannot be disseminated, reproduced, or communicated during the defined confidentiality period, even if the author (PhD graduate) wishes to do so.

At the end of the confidentiality period, the thesis is disseminated on www.theses.fr in open access or with restricted access to the academic community, depending on the author’s choice.

If necessary, the confidentiality period may be extended. A request must be made to the defending institution before the thesis becomes accessible.

Use heading styles (Heading 1, Heading 2, etc.) in your word processor to create a hierarchy that screen readers can interpret.

Add alternative text to every image, table, and figure to make them understandable for users of assistive technologies.

When exporting your thesis to PDF, ensure it is a tagged PDF, which preserves the document’s logical structure and allows screen readers to navigate the text.

Check that your thesis’s digital file complies with the General Accessibility Improvement Framework (RGAA).

Tools are available to test the accessibility of your PDF and its compliance with RGAA criteria.

The Committee for Open Science guide (Opens a new window) Dissertations, Theses, Publications: Let’s Make Them Accessible!" (MESR, 2024) provides practical advice for making your scientific publications accessible.

To facilitate the accessibility of digital websites, digital documents and services, the Interministerial Digital Directorate (DINUM) publishes the (Opens a new window) General Accessibility Improvement Framework (RGAA).

It is structured in two parts: Legal obligations (Who is covered by RGAA? What legal obligations must be met?). Technical methodology (What criteria must be met? How to test compliance?).

(Opens a new window) View the checklist

The thesis must be written in French, unless there is a justified exception. But there is a wide variety of possible exceptions and a significant proportion of PhD theses are not written in French.

• Example 1: the choice of English may be justified by the need for the thesis to be disseminated internationally and/or the presence of non-French-speaking members on the examination board. However, this is subject to the composition of the examination board and/or the dissemination of the thesis being consistent with this justification, in particular that the examination board does indeed include a non-French-speaking member and/or that the thesis is made available as open access on www.theses.fr.
• Example 2: A thesis completed as part of an international joint supervision arrangement between a French university and a German university under the European programme “MSCA - Doctoral Networks – Joint Doctorates (DN-JD)" may be written in German, provided that this has been agreed in the international joint supervision agreement between the two universities.

Comprehensive abstract in French.

All doctoral candidates, whether French or international, who have written their thesis in a language other than French are required to submit a comprehensive abstract in French alongside it. The format of this abstract is determined by the institutions where the thesis is defended and their doctoral schools, and may depend on the language chosen for the thesis. The (Opens a new window) Guide to the drafting and presentation of theses for doctoral students published by the MESR (2007) states that the substantive summary must:

• appear in the introductory pages of the manuscript (the pages following the title page and preceding the table of contents). It is therefore an integral part of the thesis manuscript.
• provide a relatively precise idea of the thesis’s content. This summary may be between 10 and 20 pages in length.
• describe the context of the research, the methodology adopted and the results obtained.
• be provided in addition to the mandatory summaries in French and English (4,000 characters) required for the legal deposit of the thesis, along with other thesis metadata.

Conditions related to the composition of the PhD defense panel

All those involved in the thesis validation process – the supervisor who approves the commencement of the defense process, the examiners, and each member of the examination board – must be proficient in the language in which the thesis is written and the language of the defense.

Article L121-3 of the Education Code (from the Toubon's Act)

"The language of teaching, examinations and competitive examinations, as well as of theses and dissertations in public and private educational institutions, is French. Exceptions may be justified […]"

Article 21 of the Decree of 25 May 2016

"The international joint supervision agreement specifies the language in which the thesis is to be written; where this language is not French, the thesis must be accompanied by a substantial summary in French".

Article L123-7 of the Education Code

"Public higher education contributes, within the international scientific and cultural community, to the exchange of ideas, the advancement of research and the bringing together of cultures. It promotes, at European and international level, greater sharing of knowledge and its dissemination to civil societies. It encourages cross-border cooperation [...]."