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Submit your eThesis

You must upload your final successful PhD thesis to White Rose eTheses Online (WREO).

Submitting an eThesis is a great way to raise your research profile, increase the impact of your work, preserve your work for the future, and fulfil any funder open access requirements.

You should only upload your eThesis after your internal examiner has approved any editorial and presentational corrections or minor deficiencies identified at your examination.

You must also discuss the retention of thesis arrangements with your supervisor(s) so that, if necessary, an embargo period can be agreed. You must ensure you are uploading the correct version that has been approved by your internal examiner.

Please note that any changes after deposit are only agreed in exceptional circumstances and need to be requested by emailing rp_examinations@adm.leeds.ac.uk

How to upload your thesis

Follow our step-by-step guide to uploading your thesis below.

You can also find further advice and guidance on the Student Education Service eThesis page.

Step 1: Create an account on WREO

  1. Go to White Rose eTheses Online (WREO).
  2. Select “Create Account” from the Deposit box.
  3. Enter your name. This must be your full legal name as held in the University's registration records, including forename and all middle names.
  4. Select your institution.
  5. Enter your student ID number.
  6. Use a long-term email address, not your University of Leeds student email address. You may need to be contacted about your eThesis after your student email address has expired. Choose a memorable username and password.
  7. Enter the words displayed when prompted.
  8. Click “register”.
  9. Activate your account from the confirmation email
  10. Enter your username and password.

Step 2: Add the details of your thesis

  1. Select “Your thesis”.
  2. Click on “Create thesis (start here)”.
  3. Follow the steps on each screen, completing all of the required fields (those with a star symbol).
  4. Ensure that you add a long-term email address.
  5. Ensure that you add the names of your supervisor(s) and their email address(es). This is important so that your supervisors receive a copy of the email notification confirming the upload of the eThesis and the embargo information selected.
  6. Check that the abstract displays as intended. Some fonts, scientific symbols and complicated formatting may display incorrectly.

Step 3: Upload the file

To upload a file:

  1. Browse to the file on your computer and upload it.
  2. Select the correct file type.
  3. Select the correct content type.
  4. Choose the agreed Creative Commons licence type.
  5. You can add multiple files if required.

You must upload the final, examined and corrected version of your thesis as a single PDF file.

In all cases, one complete eThesis file is required. However, in some cases it may also be necessary to provide a redacted version of your eThesis. Further advice on when a redacted eThesis might be required, and the process to be followed, is given on the Student Education Service eThesis page.

You should give your eThesis a standard filename that follows the format: Surname and initials, school, degree, year of submission. For example: Smith_ABC_Chemistry_PhD_2015.PDF

Step 4: Add your embargo period (if applicable)

You are expected to make your e-thesis open access immediately in WREO unless there are exceptional circumstances. For example, you may need to apply a temporary embargo if you are planning to publish part of your thesis or if there are issues of confidentiality. Any embargo should be discussed with your supervisor. To add an embargo period:

  1. Choose the appropriate embargo period from the drop down menu.
  2. Specify the reason for the embargo.

Step 5: Deposit item

  1. Add or amend any of the details if prompted.
  2. Check that you are happy with the Thesis preview.
  3. Click Deposit now, or you can choose to save for later.

Next steps

Once the upload process is complete you will receive confirmation via email. A confirmation email will also be sent to your supervisor(s) and to PGR and Operations staff.

If you need to make any changes to your deposit, do not create a new thesis record as this will create a duplicate record. You can edit items in your work area.

There will be a delay between the thesis being deposited and it going live. Final checks have to take place, and the pass list on which the thesis appears must be authorised before the eThesis will appear in WREO.