What is ORCID?
ORCID is a free and unique persistent identifier. Your ORCID iD distinguishes you from other researchers, linking to a profile you control and populate with information defining who you are, as well as your research, publications, affiliations, awards, and grants.
Increasingly used by funding agencies, publishers, and peer institutions, ORCID iDs make it easier to share data and information between various institutional, library, publisher, and funder systems.
Getting Started
Creating an ORCID iD is fast and free and can be done via Harvard ORCID Connect, which is available to anyone with a HarvardKey.
Click the link below, and once you've entered your HarvardKey, the system will walk you through the process to either create a new iD or connect your existing ORCID iD to Harvard.
Connecting your ORCID iD to Harvard authorizes the university to read your public data and authenticates the Harvard-based activities listed in your ORCID record.
Why Use Orcid?
- Uniquely yours: Distinguish yourself and claim credit for your work while controlling access to your data, no matter how many people have your same (or similar) name. Your ORCID doesn't change even if your name does.
- Open and flexible profile data: ORCID is platform-agnostic, discipline-neutral, and publisher-independent, so you can easily share your data between your record and an increasing number of funding, publishers, data and manuscript repositories, and other research workflows.
- Portable: Your ORCID iD and data will always stay with you and remain the same, even after you leave Harvard.
- Customizable visibility: ORCID links all your research together, while you control the visibility of each piece of data (public or private).
- Reduced administrative burden: Many manuscript submission, grant application, and institutional repository forms can be auto-populated, especially when you authenticate your ORCID with Harvard. You can spend more time conducting your research and less time replicating biographical data and research activities.
Orcid at Harvard
At Harvard, a connected iD means internal scholarly and administrative systems can pull in your public ORCID data, saving you time, maintaining the accuracy and consistency of your data, and creating meaningful connections between systems.
Things to know
Connecting your ORCID iD can make it easier to work with:
- Grants submission, tracking, and management systems
- Scholarly networks, repositories, and current research information systems
- Personnel assessment and human resources systems
Learn More
If you have any questions about using ORCID at Harvard, please contact the Harvard Library Open Scholarship and Research Data Services (OSRDS).
- Review ORCID’s page on visibility settings to learn more about controlling the data pushed to your profile by Harvard University
- Visit ORCID for Researchers for more information from ORCID on how to get the most from your ORCID iD
- View a sample ORCID Record
- Watch a video on how ORCID works