JMIR Publications more than doubles the number of journals with a Journal Impact Factor

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(Toronto, June 28, 2023) For nearly 25 years, JMIR Publications has been advocating open access in digital health. Now with a portfolio of 34 fully open access journals, we’ve been working hard to publish research to help drive progression in our community and celebrate the brilliant science from it. We’re proud of each and every one who contributes to the success of our journals, from our author community, editorial boards, and peer reviewers, to our teams behind the scenes. 

As a DORA signatory, we analyze the impact of our journals using a number of metrics, alternative metrics, data and practices. Today we can announce the 2023 Journal Citation Reports™ (JCR) have been released but before we explore our summary, it’s important to note there have been some changes from Clarivate who publish them.


Changes to Journal Impact Factors from Clarivate

As of the 2023 JCR released today, all Web of Science Core Collection™ journals have a Journal Impact Factor (JIF). Prior to this, JIFs were only given to journals in Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE)™ and Social Science Citation Index (SSCI)™. Now around 9,000 journals from 3,000+ publishers from Arts and Humanities Citation Index (AHCI)™ and the multidisciplinary Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI)™ now have JIFs as well. 


Another change is that JIF will now be one decimal place rather than three. Some journals may seem like their JIF has dropped as they are rounded to one decimal place, but actually, that may not be the case. This is part of Clarivate’s mission to level the playing field and encourage the use of a number of metrics to evaluate impact, rather than just JIF.


JMIR Publications sees a 133% increase in journals with a JIF

Born digital nearly 25 years ago, we have expanded our portfolio into niche and emerging areas. Gradually over the years, we’ve seen these areas become recognized and established in their own right, with a rapid increase in the number of journals available to publish in. We expect to see JIFs fluctuate over the years as our communities evolve, but our trusted editorial practices remain the same. We couldn’t be prouder of the incredible community that supports us.

We are keen to stress that the JIF is one of many metrics and should be used in part to gauge the quality or influence of an article, not in isolation. We do not support any misuse of the JIF and actively encourage all to use other measures, such as author satisfaction ratings on SciRev and Google, article usage and scores from services like Eigenfactor, Google Scholar, CiteScore, Altmetric, Plum Analytics etc., alongside new and emerging open science measures that support broader advances in science and academia. We align with DORA on the importance of contextual metrics and the need to transition the research ecosystem away from JIF dominance.

Thank you to everyone who has contributed to our continued mission towards a more open world. 14 of our 34 open access journals now have a JIF - that’s a 133% increase since last year, and we still have more journals launched in the last two years that won’t yet be relevant for metrics such as JIF and CiteScore.  

The JMIR Publications flagship and tenured journals continue to remain leading journals in their respective fields by JIF and other citation metrics:

  • JMIR Public Health and Surveillance has a JIF 8.5. Q1 in Clarivate SSCI Public Health; Q1 in SCIE Public Health, Q1 in Citescore Public Health, and Q1 in Citescore Health Informatics

  • Our flagship journal, the Journal of Medical Internet Research, has increased from 7.1 to 7.4. Q1 in Clarivate SCIE Health Care Sciences & Services; Q1 in Clarivate SCIE Medical Informatics; Q1 in Citescore Health Informatics, Ranked #1 in Google Scholar Medical Informatics

  • JMIR Mental Health has a JIF of 5.2. Q1 in Citescore Psychiatry and Mental Health

  • JMIR mHealth and uHealth has increased from 4.9 to 5. Q1 in Clarivate SCIE Health Care Sciences & Services; Q1 in Clarivate SCIE Medical Informatics; Q1 in Citescore Health Informatics, Ranked #3 in Google Scholar Medical Informatics

  • JMIR Serious Games has increased from 3.3 to 4 Q1 in Citescore Rehabilitation; Q1 in Citescore Physical Therapy, Sports Therapy and Rehabilitation

  • JMIR Medical Informatics remains at 3.2 Q1 in Citescore Health Information Management


Our journals with an inaugural JIF include:

Discover JMIR Publications complete open access journal portfolio and explore the communities progressing digital health.