Journal rankings · indicator year 2019
Choose a field to open its ranking, or a journal to find its row in its subfield’s list.
Subfield ranking · 2019
Paleontology journal rankings 2019
77 ranked journals · Subfield in Earth and Planetary Sciences
Paleontology has 77 ranked journals in 2019. The median journal has an OJR of 0.83, below the world average of 1.00, up 0.05 on 2018; Q1 starts at OJR 1.32. The top three are Journal of Archaeological Research, Journal of World Prehistory, and Cambridge Archaeological Journal.
Ranks and citation indicators: 2019. Journal access status and listed APC: source snapshot September 23, 2026.
Journals whose main subfield sits in this category and that published at least 30 citable documents (articles, reviews and conference papers) in 2016–2018, the window the 2019 score is computed on.
The OpenJournalRank Indicator (OJR) is a free, publicly available metric of a journal’s field-normalized citation impact, computed from open OpenAlex citation data. It compares citations to a journal’s papers from the previous three years with the world average for papers of the same subfield, year and type, so 1.00 is the world average and values can be compared across fields. It is computed with the NCI3 method.
The middle OJR among ranked journals in this category: half score higher, half lower. 1.00 is the world average for papers of the same subfield, year and type.
The dot is this category, the solid tick is the median of all ranked journals and the dashed line is the world average.
Share of ranked journals in this category that are fully open access, so every paper is free to read. Hybrid journals, which sell subscriptions and open single papers for a fee, are not counted.
Median list price of the article processing charge, in US dollars, among ranked journals in this category that list a price above zero. Journals with a listed APC of $0 and journals with no known price are left out of this median. The At a glance table below gives a second median that includes the $0 prices.
Subfields of Earth and Planetary Sciences (8)
77 ranked journals
Filters
Rank is the position by OJR within the list on screen; 1 is the highest. | OJR is field-normalized 3-year citation impact: 1.00 is the world average for papers of the same subfield, year and type, so values compare across fields. The badge is the journal’s quartile in this list. | Citations per paper over a two-year window, counted from OpenAlex. It is not field-normalized, so compare it only between journals of the same field. ▲ or ▼ is the change from 2018. This is OpenJournalRank’s own count, not Clarivate’s Journal Impact Factor. | Citable documents (articles, reviews and conference papers) published in 2016–2018, the window the 2019 OJR is computed on. A journal needs at least 30 to be ranked. | Share of the journal’s 2016–2018 papers that are free to read in any open-access form. The green OA tag next to a title marks a fully open-access journal. | List price of the article processing charge in US dollars. “$0 listed” means the listed price is zero; a dash means no price is listed. | The line is the journal’s OJR from 2010 to 2019. | Compare |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1Journal of Archaeological ResearchSpringer Nature · Netherlands | 4.57Q1 | 5.39 2.87 up from 2018 | 34 | 36% | $3,190 | ||
2Journal of World PrehistorySpringer Nature · United States | 3.87Q1 | 5.00 1.14 up from 2018 | 33 | 58% | $3,290 | ||
3Cambridge Archaeological JournalCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 3.70Q1 | 3.45 1.23 up from 2018 | 142 | 29% | $3,550 | ||
4Journal of Anthropological ArchaeologyElsevier BV · United States | 2.58Q1 | 2.71 0.08 down from 2018 | 177 | 36% | $3,370 | ||
5European Journal of ArchaeologyCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 2.40Q1 | 2.08 0.72 up from 2018 | 99 | 36% | $3,550 | ||
6Proceedings of the Prehistoric SocietyCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 2.13Q1 | 3.33 2.20 up from 2018 | 48 | 67% | $3,550 | ||
7GeobiologyWiley · United Kingdom | 2.06Q1 | 4.31 0.69 down from 2018 | 137 | 37% | $4,880 | ||
8PalaeontologyWiley · United Kingdom | 1.76Q1 | 3.67 0.39 up from 2018 | 187 | 45% | $5,000 | ||
9Journal of Field ArchaeologyTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 1.73Q1 | 2.04 0.57 up from 2018 | 140 | 32% | — | ||
10Newsletters on StratigraphyGebrüder Borntraeger Verlagsbuchhandlung · Germany | 1.70Q1 | 3.69 1.04 down from 2018 | 64 | 17% | — | ||
11AntiquityCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 1.57Q1 | 1.57 0.01 up from 2018 | 711 | 49% | $3,550 | ||
12Archaeological Research in AsiaElsevier BV · Netherlands | 1.57Q1 | 1.80 0.48 up from 2018 | 110 | 20% | $2,750 | ||
13American AntiquityCambridge University Press · United States | 1.55Q1 | 2.46 0.41 up from 2018 | 182 | 17% | $3,550 | ||
14Vegetation History and ArchaeobotanySpringer Science+Business Media · Germany | 1.46Q1 | 2.83 0.42 up from 2018 | 152 | 49% | $3,790 | ||
15Norwegian Archaeological ReviewRoutledge · Norway | 1.43Q1 | 1.89 1.11 up from 2018 | 60 | 25% | — | ||
16Zoological Journal of the Linnean SocietyOxford University Press · United Kingdom | 1.42Q1 | 3.17 0.48 up from 2018 | 380 | 54% | $3,541 | ||
17Journal of Systematic PalaeontologyTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 1.41Q1 | 3.02 0.52 up from 2018 | 164 | 31% | — | ||
18Journal of PalaeogeographyOAElsevier BV · China | 1.41Q1 | 3.34 0.33 down from 2018 | 70 | 100% | $1,500 | ||
19Journal of Archaeological Science ReportsElsevier BV · United Kingdom | 1.36Q1 | 1.76 0.03 up from 2018 | 1,389 | 38% | $2,910 | ||
20PaleobiologyCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 1.32Q1 | 2.45 0.01 down from 2018 | 144 | 62% | $3,550 | ||
21Comptes Rendus PalevolOAMuséum national d'histoire naturelle · France | 1.22Q2 | 1.49 0.25 down from 2018 | 209 | 48% | — | ||
22Papers in PalaeontologyWiley · United States | 1.20Q2 | 2.74 0.17 up from 2018 | 92 | 33% | $4,480 | ||
23Journal of AnatomyWiley · United Kingdom | 1.19Q2 | 2.38 0.58 down from 2018 | 436 | 92% | $4,050 | ||
24Open ArchaeologyOADe Gruyter Open · Poland | 1.15Q2 | 1.73 0.22 down from 2018 | 82 | 100% | $848 | ||
25Environmental ArchaeologyTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 1.11Q2 | 1.97 0.89 up from 2018 | 128 | 49% | — | ||
26Journal of Vertebrate PaleontologyTaylor & Francis · United States | 1.09Q2 | 2.50 0.39 up from 2018 | 331 | 31% | — | ||
27Journal of Mammalian EvolutionSpringer Science+Business Media · Netherlands | 1.09Q2 | 2.05 0.16 up from 2018 | 137 | 44% | $3,790 | ||
28Fossil recordOAWiley · Germany | 1.07Q2 | 2.35 0.35 up from 2018 | 48 | 100% | $1,240 | ||
29LethaiaOAWiley · Norway | 1.06Q2 | 2.59 0.89 up from 2018 | 122 | 24% | $3,300 | ||
30RadiocarbonCambridge University Press · United States | 0.96Q2 | 2.10 0.30 up from 2018 | 413 | 47% | $2,487 | ||
31Acta Palaeontologica PolonicaOAInstitute of Paleobiology · Poland | 0.95Q2 | 1.99 0.15 down from 2018 | 150 | 100% | $23 | ||
32The Anatomical RecordWiley · United States | 0.93Q2 | 2.51 1.02 up from 2018 | 637 | 71% | $4,430 | ||
33Cretaceous ResearchElsevier BV · United Kingdom | 0.92Q2 | 2.27 0.02 down from 2018 | 735 | 25% | $3,560 | ||
34Palaeontologia ElectronicaOAUnited States | 0.92Q2 | 1.67 0.10 down from 2018 | 184 | 100% | — | ||
35PalaiosSociety for Sedimentary Geology · United States | 0.88Q2 | 1.96 0.02 down from 2018 | 169 | 23% | — | ||
36Ancient MesoamericaCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 0.86Q2 | 0.77 0.10 up from 2018 | 109 | 32% | $3,550 | ||
37Historical BiologyTaylor & Francis · Switzerland | 0.85Q2 | 1.79 0.38 up from 2018 | 367 | 15% | — | ||
38Journal of MorphologyWiley · United States | 0.85Q2 | 1.70 0.04 down from 2018 | 351 | 19% | $4,220 | ||
39FaciesSpringer Science+Business Media · Germany | 0.83Q2 | 1.83 0.10 down from 2018 | 87 | 17% | $2,490 | ||
40GeobiosElsevier BV · France | 0.77Q3 | 1.68 0.25 up from 2018 | 128 | 48% | $3,030 | ||
41PalaeoworldElsevier BV · Netherlands | 0.76Q3 | 1.87 0.58 up from 2018 | 140 | 22% | $3,000 | ||
42Proceedings of the Geologists AssociationElsevier BV · United Kingdom | 0.75Q3 | 1.70 0.08 up from 2018 | 205 | 9% | $3,300 | ||
43GeodiversitasOAMuséum national d'histoire naturelle · France | 0.74Q3 | 1.78 0.25 up from 2018 | 74 | 88% | — | ||
44Bulletin of GeosciencesOACzechia | 0.73Q3 | 1.56 0.10 down from 2018 | 91 | 100% | — | ||
45Palaeobiodiversity and PalaeoenvironmentsSpringer Nature · Germany | 0.73Q3 | 1.66 0.28 up from 2018 | 126 | 41% | $3,190 | ||
46Netherlands Journal of Geosciences – Geologie en MijnbouwCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 0.73Q3 | 1.82 0.84 up from 2018 | 102 | 100% | $1,725 | ||
47Earth and Environmental Science Transactions of the Royal Society of EdinburghCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 0.72Q3 | 0.98 0.05 down from 2018 | 132 | 33% | $3,550 | ||
48Paläontologische ZeitschriftSpringer Nature · Germany | 0.70Q3 | 1.50 0.13 up from 2018 | 143 | 36% | $3,190 | ||
49Bulletin of the Peabody Museum of Natural HistoryUnited States | 0.69Q3 | 2.00 0.40 up from 2018 | 33 | 0% | — | ||
50Alcheringa An Australasian Journal of PalaeontologyTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 0.67Q3 | 1.44 0.04 up from 2018 | 133 | 13% | — |
Subfields of Earth and Planetary Sciences, with Paleontology highlighted.
- Geophysics147
- Atmospheric Science87
- Paleontology77
- Oceanography56
- Earth-Surface Processes17
- Geology10
- Geochemistry and Petrology9
- Space and Planetary Science4
Journals
Citations made in 2019. Corpus-wide, 83.4% of core-journal articles and reviews published that year have at least one matched reference; the share varies by journal and field.
20 additional Paleontology journals with metrics are unranked under this release’s eligibility rules: a journal needs at least 30 citable documents in 2016–2018, at least 80% of them with a subfield, and a positive world-average expectation. Ranks are within the whole category; filters hide rows without re-ranking. OJR excludes self-citations.
At a glance
Indicator year: 2019. Publication window: 2016–2018. How these summaries are calculated
- Ranked journals
- 77
- Window papers (baseline)
- 19,477 +8.5% from indicator year 2016
- Median OJR
- 0.832 -10.5% from indicator year 2016
- Rising journals (2025)
- 5
Window papers are the baseline paper population: citable papers (articles, reviews and conference papers) from 2016–2018 in all journals of the world-average baseline, including non-core journals, counted by each paper’s own subfield. They are not the papers of the ranked journals alone.
| Measure | Year series | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ranked journals | 53 | 53 | 54 | 53 | 53 | 51 | 53 | 61 | 62 | 63 | 64 | 66 | 66 | 69 | 71 | 71 | 70 | 73 | 76 | 77 | 76 | 78 | 78 | 77 | 73 | 77 | |
| Window papers (baseline) | 7,057 | 7,924 | 8,570 | 9,199 | 9,500 | 9,801 | 10,405 | 10,925 | 11,640 | 12,204 | 12,986 | 13,788 | 14,602 | 15,085 | 15,876 | 16,591 | 17,958 | 18,584 | 19,596 | 19,477 | 19,946 | 19,760 | 20,309 | 19,925 | 19,964 | 19,466 | |
| Median OJR | 0.75 | 0.61 | 0.619 | 0.63 | 0.620 | 0.708 | 0.660 | 0.65 | 0.69 | 0.715 | 0.7325 | 0.735 | 0.80 | 0.81 | 0.829 | 0.90 | 0.93 | 0.87 | 0.79 | 0.832 | 0.831 | 0.78 | 0.7318 | 0.68 | 0.657 | 0.64 |
How to read these rankings
- OJR, the OpenJournalRank Indicator
- A field-normalized 3-year citation impact, computed from OpenAlex with the NCI3 method. It divides the citations a journal’s papers received by the world average for papers of the same subfield, year and type, so 1.00 is the world average and 2.00 means twice as many citations as expected. Because it is normalized, it can be compared across fields. Read the methodology
- Quartiles
- Q1 to Q4 split the ranked journals of the list you are viewing into four equal groups by OJR. A journal’s quartile depends on the list: the same journal can be Q1 in its subfield and Q2 among all journals.
- Impact factor (2-year)
- Citations per paper over a two-year window, counted from OpenAlex. It is easy to compare with familiar impact factors but is not field-normalized, so compare it only within a field. It is not Clarivate’s Journal Impact Factor. Why it differs from the Journal Impact Factor
- Rank ranges
- Each rank in the latest year carries a likely range from 1,000 resamples of the journal’s papers. Where two journals’ ranges overlap, the data cannot tell them apart, so treat neighbouring ranks as ties.