Rules and regulations
The University of Copenhagen enables you to train as a researcher and gain a PhD in accordance with the provisions of the Ministerial Order on the PhD Programme at the Universities, the PhD Order (no. 1124 of 19 September 2025 on PhD qualifications).
UCPH's common PhD rules and regulations
The University of Copenhagen has adopted a set of common regulations and guidelines for PhD students admitted to UCPH.
Below, there is a list of specific rules and regulations regarding the PhD process at UCPH:
PhD students are not responsible for legal deposit of their PhD thesis.
PhD theses are only subject to deposit if they have been published i.e. made available to the public with the author’s consent, for example through loan or sale.
Legal deposit of PhD theses published in printed form is carried out directly by the printing house, while digitally published dissertations are harvested automatically as part of the collection of the Danish portion of the internet. This means that regardless of the publishing format, the PhD student is not involved with depositing their thesis.
The fact that a PhD thesis is made public in print or digital format prior to the PhD defence does not in itself constitute grounds for legal deposit.
As a PhD student, you own the copyright to your PhD thesis unless other agreements have been made. This means that you have the right to decide whether or not your thesis should be published, edited, or otherwise disseminated to the public after the defense. However, it is a requirement that the thesis must be made publicly accessible in due time before the defense, and the responsibility for this lies with the university (PhD Order section 19, subsection 2).
If copyrighted materials are reproduced in the thesis (figures, photos, tables etc.) the responsibility for clearing the rights rests with you as the PhD student. If you intend to make your thesis accessible after the defense, both physically and/or digitally, this information must also be provided during the rights clearance process. In other words, when obtaining permission from the rights holder, you must clearly indicate how you plan to make the thesis available, so that the rights holder can grant permission on an informed basis.
If your thesis includes published articles, please be aware that the copyright for these articles may have been transferred to the publisher. In such cases, you need to ensure that the publisher permits the inclusion of the articles in the dissertations.
Please note that the copyright must be cleared before submitting the the thesis, and that it must be stated in the thesis that the necessary permissions have been obtained.
Read more about reuse of others’ material on the Research Portal (KUnet)
In synopsis-based theses, you, as a PhD student, own the copyright to the synopsis as well as to articles or manuscripts in the thesis that are not covered by a publishing agreement. It is very common that the copyright of published articles is assigned to the publisher. Most publishers allow articles in PhD theses, but there are publishers who do not allow it, or only allow it under certain conditions.
Before submitting your manuscript, it is recommended that you examine the publisher's or journal's policies and guidelines for articles in PhD theses. You should also be aware that even if a publisher allows articles in PhD theses, the publisher may have policies on how you can make the thesis with the included articles accessible after the defense. For instance, certain publishers may have restrictions on digital availability – this also applies to digital availability via CURIS or other non-commercial repositories.
If the articles you include in your thesis have been published as Open Access under Creative Commons licenses, you may always.
Read more about Creative Commons licenses on the Research Portal (Kunet)
UCPH’s common regulations and guidelines set out the common minimum standards for PhD studies at the University.
Faculties each set additional provisions. UCPH’s common regulations and guidelines can therefore not 'stand alone' but should be read in conjunction with the additional provisions of the relevant graduate school.
Complaint guidance for PhD-students
According to the Danish PhD Order, you can file a complaint with the Danish Agency for Higher Education and Science about legal issues relating to a decision by your PhD School.
The deadline for filing a complaint is two weeks from the day you received the decision.
In accordance with section 30 (1) of the Order, complaints filed with the Agency are limited to legal issues, which means that you can complain if you find that the rules that are applicable to the case processing and the decision made have not been complied with. You cannot complain about the academic assessments that have provided the grounds for the PhD School’s decision.
You must submit your complaint by email to the relevant graduate school.
The PhD School then gives a statement in the case, which you will receive for commenting. The deadline for submitting comments to the statement will be at least one week, but you will be informed about the exact date when you receive the statement. The University then forwards the complaint and the University's statement to the Danish Agency for Higher Education and Science along with your comments and any other relevant documents in the case."