Library Guides: Where to Publish Your Research: Evaluate journals before submitting articles

Check the following vetted listings of journals and publishers to find quality publications

Scopus Source List
There is a content selection & advisory board (CSAB) who use strict criteria to vet the sources covered by Scopus.
Web of Science Master List of Journals
Journals must go through a selection process before being added to Web of Science.
ERIH Plus-European Reference Index for Humanities and the Social Sciences
Journal Quality List
Collation of journal rankings from a variety of sources, compiled by Prof. Anne Wil-Harzing,
Directory of Open Access Journals
Community-curated online directory that indexes and provides access to high quality, open access, peer-reviewed journals.
Use OAJF (Open Access Journal Finder) to locate journals in the DOAJ that are relevant to your research.
Quality Open Access Market
Provides quality scoring of open access journals based on academic crowd sourcing.
Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) Membership List
Check to see if the journal or publisher is a member of COPE.
OASPA: Open Access Scholarly Publishing Association
Check to see if the journal publisher is a member of OASPA. "Approved members have been through a rigorous application review process and adhere to OASPA's Code of Conduct."

MLA Directory of Periodicals
A directory of periodicals in literature, language, linguistics, folklore.
Free account can be created for personalization.
Date Coverage: Current
Maximum Users: Unlimited
Truncation: Truncation: *; Wildcard: ?

Academic Journal Guide
Chartered Association of Business Schools listing of business and management journals. Includes ratings. Must register to view guide.
Journals indexed by Medline
Biomedical journals.
Use drop down menu at top of page to sort journals by title.
International Academy of Nursing Editors Journal Directory
Vetted list of reputable nursing journals that meet explicit criteria
IFIS (International Food Information Service) Journal Lookup Service
Check to see whether a journal has been assessed for inclusion in the Food Science & Technology database.
Members list of the Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA)
Members must agree to follow including transparency in their author fees.

Check journal rankings

Evaluate a journal
Check impact factor, citescore and other quality metrics all in one place.
Requires login with MU user name and password.
Journal impact factors
Journal ranking used by the Web of Science and available from the Journal Citation Reports..
A journal impact factor is essentially the average number of times an article in a particular journal is cited over the previous 2 years.
Impact factors are only computed for science and social science journals indexed in Web of Science Core.
CiteScore
Journal ranking used by the Scopus database.
CiteScore is essentially the average number of times an article in a particular journal is cited over the previous 3 years.
More information on journal rankings

Use checklists to assess credentials of a journal or publisher

Be iNFORMED: Checklist
Think Check Submit
Open Access Journal Quality Indicators
Grand Valley State University guide for what to watch out for when publishing in open access journals.
Principles of Transparency & Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing
Check to see if the journal adheres to the principles and best practices established by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), the Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA), and the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME)
Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals
International Committee of Medical Journal Editors guidelines.

Check acceptance rates to see how selective the journal is

Guide for finding journal acceptance rates

Check turnaround time for article publication.

Many publishers are providing data for turnaround time on their journal websites. Sometimes referred to as Speed Metrics.

Following are some publishers that now provide this information:

American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Journals
Journal Insights (Elsevier)
Provides speed metrics for some of the journals published by Elsevier.
Elsevier Journal Finder
Enter article title and abstract and then sort journal candidates by Time to 1st decision or Time to publication.
Taylor & Francis
Springer Nature
Provides speed or turn around information in the metrics section on the "about this journal" pages.
Wiley Journal Finder
Provides number of days from submission to first decision and acceptance to online publication.
DOAJ- Directory of Open Access Journals
Provides average time between submission and publication for open access journals.

Check the open access policies of journals

Use the following online tool to find information about publishers' open access policies so that you can make informed decisions about making your research openly accessible.

open policy finder
Use this site to find a summary of permissions that are normally given as part of
each publisher's copyright transfer agreement.