Journal quality
Consider journal quality when you:
- want to publish
- choose what you will read or cite
- are evaluating your overall publication metrics.
There are multiple indicators of journal quality. Some of them are discipline specific. Use journal impact measures with other metrics as no single number will give a complete picture.
Use Journal Search (UQ login required) in UQ eSpace to evaluate the different quality measures of a journal or list of journals.
Journal quality indicators
Find this indicator via Journal citation reports. It is updated yearly.
How it is calculated
Journal Impact Factor (JIF) is:
- based on Web of Science
- calculated by citations received in the year from articles, reviews and proceedings papers published in the previous 2 years.
Eligible journals
All Web of Science Core Collection journals are eligible for the JIF, including:
- Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE)
- Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI)
- Arts and Humanities Citation Index (AHCI)
Arts and Humanities only categories will not be ranked by JIF (i.e. a rank and quartile will not be available for these journals). - Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI).
Use when
Publications are indexed in Web of Science.
Cannot be used to compare across different disciplines.
More about Journal Impact Factor
Find this indicator via Journal citation reports. It is updated yearly.
How it is calculated
Journal Citation Indicator (JCI) is:
- based on Web of Science
- the value is the mean Category Normalised Citation Impact (CNCI) for all articles and reviews published in the most recent three years (e.g. a value of 1.0 means that across the journal, published papers received a number of citations equal to the average citation count in that category).
Eligible journals
All Web of Science Core Collection journals are eligible for the JIF, including:
- Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE)
- Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI)
- Arts and Humanities Citation Index (AHCI)
- Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI).
Use when
Publications are indexed in Web of Science.
The normalisation steps make it more reasonable to compare journals across categories, but comparisons are best made in adjacent fields that share similar citation patterns (within the Physical Sciences or Arts and Humanities, for example).
More about Journal Citation Indicator
Find this indicator via Sources in Scopus.
How it is calculated
CiteScore is:
- based on Scopus
- citations received in the previous year from all documents (articles, reviews, conference proceedings, editorials, errata, letters, notes and short surveys) published in the previous 3 years.
It is updated yearly.
CiteScore metrics FAQs and video tutorial.
Use when
Publications are indexed in Scopus.
Cannot be used to compare across different disciplines.
Find this indicator via Sources in Scopus.
How it is calculated
Source Normalised Impact per Paper (SNIP) is:
- based on Scopus
- calculated by citations received in the year from articles, reviews and conference papers published in the previous 3 years
- normalised to local citation environment
Use when
Use for Engineering, Computer Science and Social Science disciplines when:
- journal rank is not important
- investigating across different fields.
Find via the Scimago Journal and Country Rank.
How it is calculated
Scimago Journal Rank is:
- based on Scopus
- calculated by citations received in the year from articles, reviews and conference papers published in the previous 3 years
- normalised to citation behaviour in different subject areas.
Citations are weighted on the prestige of the issuing journal and self-citations are limited (up to one-third of total received).
Use when
Use for Life and Health Science disciplines:
- in fields where the best journals cover the most topical research
- when investigating across different fields.
Find at Eigenfactor Journal Ranking.
How it is calculated
Eigenfactor:
- based on Web of Science and Journal Citation Reports
- calculated by citation received in the year from publications in the previous 5 years
- excludes self-citations.
Citations from highly cited journals influence the score more than citations from lesser cited journals.
Use for
Established researchers with publications indexed in Web of Science.
Journal listings
The Essential Science Indicators journal list includes all active journal titles that are eligible to be included in Essential Science Indicators (ESI), a schema used to classify highly cited papers in Web of Science.
Business, Economics and Tourism
The Australian Business Deans Council Journal Quality List is targeted at the business discipline in Australia.
Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences
- Arts and Humanities Citation Index
- Australian Political Studies Association Preferred Journal List
- Social Sciences Citation Index
Science and Engineering
- Nature index includes a selected group of high quality science journals.
- The CORE Rankings Portal is targeted at the computer science discipline, ranking conferences and journals in Australia.