Journal rankings · indicator year 2021
Choose a field to open its ranking, or a journal to find its row in its subfield’s list.
Subfield ranking · 2021
Paleontology journal rankings 2021
78 ranked journals · Subfield in Earth and Planetary Sciences
Paleontology has 78 ranked journals in 2021. The median journal has an OJR of 0.78, below the world average of 1.00, down 0.05 on 2020; Q1 starts at OJR 1.07. The top three are Journal of Archaeological Research, Journal of World Prehistory, and Journal of Field Archaeology.
Ranks and citation indicators: 2021. 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 2018–2020, the window the 2021 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)
78 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 2020. This is OpenJournalRank’s own count, not Clarivate’s Journal Impact Factor. | Citable documents (articles, reviews and conference papers) published in 2018–2020, the window the 2021 OJR is computed on. A journal needs at least 30 to be ranked. | Share of the journal’s 2018–2020 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 2012 to 2021. | Compare |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1Journal of Archaeological ResearchSpringer Nature · Netherlands | 3.28Q1 | 4.71 3.74 down from 2020 | 30 | 42% | $3,190 | ||
2Journal of World PrehistorySpringer Nature · United States | 3.00Q1 | 4.43 0.44 down from 2020 | 35 | 69% | $3,290 | ||
3Journal of Field ArchaeologyTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 2.20Q1 | 3.05 0.12 up from 2020 | 131 | 41% | — | ||
4RadiocarbonCambridge University Press · United States | 1.90Q1 | 7.39 5.84 up from 2020 | 436 | 68% | $2,487 | ||
5Journal of Anthropological ArchaeologyElsevier BV · United States | 1.84Q1 | 2.48 0.66 down from 2020 | 222 | 41% | $3,370 | ||
6Norwegian Archaeological ReviewRoutledge · Norway | 1.83Q1 | 1.42 0.08 down from 2020 | 55 | 50% | — | ||
7PalaeontologyWiley · United Kingdom | 1.54Q1 | 3.44 0.55 down from 2020 | 170 | 59% | $5,000 | ||
8GeobiologyWiley · United Kingdom | 1.52Q1 | 4.56 0.26 down from 2020 | 138 | 48% | $4,880 | ||
9Archaeological Research in AsiaElsevier BV · Netherlands | 1.33Q1 | 2.12 0.19 up from 2020 | 107 | 30% | $2,750 | ||
10Papers in PalaeontologyWiley · United States | 1.31Q1 | 2.84 0.62 up from 2020 | 137 | 30% | $4,480 | ||
11American AntiquityCambridge University Press · United States | 1.30Q1 | 2.23 0.33 up from 2020 | 153 | 26% | $3,550 | ||
12Proceedings of the Prehistoric SocietyCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 1.29Q1 | 2.34 0.78 up from 2020 | 46 | 60% | $3,550 | ||
13Zoological Journal of the Linnean SocietyOxford University Press · United Kingdom | 1.28Q1 | 3.44 0.41 up from 2020 | 455 | 90% | $3,541 | ||
14AntiquityCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 1.28Q1 | 1.41 0.38 down from 2020 | 696 | 60% | $3,550 | ||
15European Journal of ArchaeologyCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 1.26Q1 | 1.80 0.14 up from 2020 | 88 | 54% | $3,550 | ||
16Journal of Systematic PalaeontologyTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 1.25Q1 | 3.24 1.07 up from 2020 | 155 | 31% | — | ||
17Journal of PalaeogeographyOAElsevier BV · China | 1.18Q1 | 3.17 0.38 up from 2020 | 78 | 100% | $1,500 | ||
18Cambridge Archaeological JournalCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 1.11Q1 | 1.26 0.60 down from 2020 | 142 | 61% | $3,550 | ||
19Journal of Archaeological Science ReportsElsevier BV · United Kingdom | 1.08Q1 | 1.82 0.17 down from 2020 | 1,368 | 47% | $2,910 | ||
20PaleobiologyCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 1.07Q1 | 2.93 0.62 up from 2020 | 158 | 82% | $3,550 | ||
21Journal of Mammalian EvolutionSpringer Science+Business Media · Netherlands | 1.07Q2 | 2.46 0.10 up from 2020 | 105 | 40% | $3,790 | ||
22Newsletters on StratigraphyGebrüder Borntraeger Verlagsbuchhandlung · Germany | 1.05Q2 | 2.51 0.37 down from 2020 | 61 | 25% | — | ||
23Vegetation History and ArchaeobotanySpringer Science+Business Media · Germany | 1.03Q2 | 2.78 0.05 up from 2020 | 141 | 58% | $3,790 | ||
24Journal of AnatomyWiley · United Kingdom | 1.01Q2 | 3.01 0.19 up from 2020 | 559 | 91% | $4,050 | ||
25Southeastern ArchaeologyTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 0.97Q2 | 1.26 0.07 up from 2020 | 56 | 0% | — | ||
26Journal of Vertebrate PaleontologyTaylor & Francis · United States | 0.97Q2 | 2.53 0.43 up from 2020 | 340 | 38% | — | ||
27Fossil recordOAWiley · Germany | 0.93Q2 | 1.76no change | 50 | 100% | $1,240 | ||
28PalaiosSociety for Sedimentary Geology · United States | 0.89Q2 | 2.33 0.42 up from 2020 | 139 | 20% | — | ||
29Comptes Rendus PalevolOAMuséum national d'histoire naturelle · France | 0.87Q2 | 1.88 0.41 up from 2020 | 137 | 100% | — | ||
30Open ArchaeologyOADe Gruyter Open · Poland | 0.86Q2 | 1.07 0.16 down from 2020 | 83 | 100% | $848 | ||
31GeobiosElsevier BV · France | 0.86Q2 | 1.93 0.39 up from 2020 | 125 | 24% | $3,030 | ||
32FaciesSpringer Science+Business Media · Germany | 0.85Q2 | 2.07 0.37 up from 2020 | 109 | 41% | $2,490 | ||
33Environmental ArchaeologyTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 0.85Q2 | 2.01 0.41 up from 2020 | 123 | 40% | — | ||
34Earth and Environmental Science Transactions of the Royal Society of EdinburghCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 0.84Q2 | 0.88 0.48 down from 2020 | 90 | 62% | $3,550 | ||
35PalaeodiversityOAState Museum of Natural History Stuttgart · Germany | 0.84Q2 | 2.08 0.99 up from 2020 | 33 | 100% | — | ||
36Acta Palaeontologica PolonicaOAInstitute of Paleobiology · Poland | 0.81Q2 | 2.14 0.08 up from 2020 | 177 | 100% | $23 | ||
| 0.80Q2 | 3.05 1.99 up from 2020 | 33 | 100% | — | |||
38Cretaceous ResearchElsevier BV · United Kingdom | 0.80Q2 | 2.26 0.25 up from 2020 | 802 | 27% | $3,560 | ||
39Palaeontologia ElectronicaOAUnited States | 0.79Q2 | 2.04 0.36 up from 2020 | 200 | 100% | — | ||
40Latin American AntiquityCambridge University Press · United States | 0.78Q3 | 1.28 0.18 up from 2020 | 175 | 39% | $3,550 | ||
41Netherlands Journal of Geosciences – Geologie en MijnbouwCambridge University Press · United Kingdom | 0.72Q3 | 2.46 0.05 down from 2020 | 44 | 100% | $1,725 | ||
42Historical BiologyTaylor & Francis · Switzerland | 0.72Q3 | 1.65 0.03 down from 2020 | 417 | 18% | — | ||
43The Anatomical RecordWiley · United States | 0.70Q3 | 2.26 0.37 down from 2020 | 713 | 47% | $4,430 | ||
44PalaeoworldElsevier BV · Netherlands | 0.69Q3 | 1.72 0.43 down from 2020 | 175 | 14% | $3,000 | ||
45Journal of MorphologyWiley · United States | 0.69Q3 | 2.01 0.37 up from 2020 | 373 | 34% | $4,220 | ||
46GeodiversitasOAMuséum national d'histoire naturelle · France | 0.67Q3 | 2.24 0.49 up from 2020 | 81 | 93% | — | ||
47LethaiaOAWiley · Norway | 0.66Q3 | 1.49 0.44 down from 2020 | 134 | 41% | $3,300 | ||
48Paläontologische ZeitschriftSpringer Nature · Germany | 0.63Q3 | 1.55 0.50 up from 2020 | 140 | 66% | $3,190 | ||
49Bulletin of GeosciencesOACzechia | 0.61Q3 | 1.45 0.04 down from 2020 | 75 | 100% | — | ||
50Journal of Iberian GeologySpringer International Publishing · Spain | 0.60Q3 | 1.79 0.17 down from 2020 | 98 | 55% | $3,190 |
Subfields of Earth and Planetary Sciences, with Paleontology highlighted.
- Geophysics144
- Atmospheric Science88
- Paleontology78
- Oceanography53
- Earth-Surface Processes18
- Geology10
- Geochemistry and Petrology7
- Space and Planetary Science4
Journals
Citations made in 2021. Corpus-wide, 87.7% of core-journal articles and reviews published that year have at least one matched reference; the share varies by journal and field.
16 additional Paleontology journals with metrics are unranked under this release’s eligibility rules: a journal needs at least 30 citable documents in 2018–2020, 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: 2021. Publication window: 2018–2020. How these summaries are calculated
- Ranked journals
- 78
- Window papers (baseline)
- 19,760 +0.8% from indicator year 2018
- Median OJR
- 0.78 -0.2% from indicator year 2018
- Rising journals (2025)
- 5
Window papers are the baseline paper population: citable papers (articles, reviews and conference papers) from 2018–2020 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.