Journal rankings · indicator year 2022
Choose a field to open its ranking, or a journal to find its row in its subfield’s list.
Subfield ranking · 2022
Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics journal rankings 2022
103 ranked journals · Subfield in Physics and Astronomy
Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics has 103 ranked journals in 2022. The median journal has an OJR of 0.66, below the world average of 1.00, down 0.01 on 2021; Q1 starts at OJR 1.29. The top three are Reviews of Modern Physics, Nature Photonics, and Advances in Optics and Photonics.
Ranks and citation indicators: 2022. 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 2019–2021, the window the 2022 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 Physics and Astronomy (8)
103 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 2021. This is OpenJournalRank’s own count, not Clarivate’s Journal Impact Factor. | Citable documents (articles, reviews and conference papers) published in 2019–2021, the window the 2022 OJR is computed on. A journal needs at least 30 to be ranked. | Share of the journal’s 2019–2021 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 2013 to 2022. | Compare |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1Reviews of Modern PhysicsAmerican Physical Society · United States | 19.63Q1 | 50.52 4.28 down from 2021 | 103 | 79% | — | ||
2Nature PhotonicsNature Portfolio · United Kingdom | 7.37Q1 | 22.95 2.59 down from 2021 | 551 | 35% | $12,690 | ||
3Advances in Optics and PhotonicsOptica Publishing Group · United States | 6.27Q1 | 27.30 7.51 up from 2021 | 50 | 62% | — | ||
4Reports on Progress in PhysicsIOP Publishing · United Kingdom | 5.44Q1 | 15.12 0.63 down from 2021 | 121 | 73% | $4,680 | ||
5Light Science & ApplicationsOASpringer Nature · United Kingdom | 4.95Q1 | 17.96 1.66 down from 2021 | 548 | 100% | $4,190 | ||
6PhotoniXOASpringer Nature · Singapore | 4.71Q1 | 18.98 4.25 down from 2021 | 44 | 100% | $2,239 | ||
7Nature PhysicsNature Portfolio · United Kingdom | 4.06Q1 | 11.07 0.84 down from 2021 | 982 | 47% | $12,690 | ||
8Physical Review XOAAmerican Physical Society · United States | 3.62Q1 | 10.22 1.81 down from 2021 | 796 | 100% | $4,200 | ||
9OpticaOAOptica Publishing Group · United States | 3.08Q1 | 9.88 0.61 down from 2021 | 752 | 100% | $3,208 | ||
10Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews Computational Molecular ScienceWiley · United States | 3.07Q1 | 11.11 0.33 down from 2021 | 157 | 46% | $5,230 | ||
11Progress in Quantum ElectronicsElsevier BV · United Kingdom | 3.03Q1 | 10.85 2.01 up from 2021 | 44 | 41% | $4,090 | ||
12Physical Review LettersAmerican Physical Society · United States | 2.95Q1 | 9.02 0.62 down from 2021 | 7,877 | 77% | $3,750 | ||
13AVS Quantum ScienceUnited States | 2.67Q1 | 7.52 3.26 down from 2021 | 54 | 78% | — | ||
14SciPost PhysicsOASciPost.org · Netherlands | 2.07Q1 | 5.45 1.64 down from 2021 | 618 | 100% | — | ||
15Light Advanced ManufacturingOAChina | 2.03Q1 | 7.12 6.84 up from 2021 | 41 | 100% | — | ||
16Photonics ResearchOptica Publishing Group · United States | 1.99Q1 | 7.33 0.27 up from 2021 | 857 | 17% | — | ||
17APL PhotonicsOAAIP Publishing · United States | 1.83Q1 | 6.07 0.64 down from 2021 | 439 | 100% | $2,750 | ||
18International Reviews in Physical ChemistryTaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 1.81Q1 | 5.43 1.43 down from 2021 | 35 | 29% | — | ||
19Communications PhysicsOANature Portfolio · United Kingdom | 1.78Q1 | 5.34 1.00 down from 2021 | 651 | 100% | $3,990 | ||
20Advances in Physics XOATaylor & Francis · United Kingdom | 1.71Q1 | 5.64 0.99 down from 2021 | 103 | 100% | $1,895 | ||
21Nature Reviews PhysicsNature Portfolio · United Kingdom | 1.68Q1 | 14.60 1.11 up from 2021 | 367 | 36% | — | ||
22Journal of Chemical Theory and ComputationAmerican Chemical Society · United States | 1.51Q1 | 5.38 0.97 down from 2021 | 1,774 | 53% | $4,500 | ||
23Frontiers of PhysicsHigher Education Press · China | 1.48Q1 | 5.71 0.82 up from 2021 | 247 | 13% | $3,890 | ||
24Physical Review ResearchOAAmerican Physical Society · United States | 1.34Q1 | 4.26 0.36 down from 2021 | 3,623 | 100% | $2,625 | ||
25Science China Physics Mechanics and AstronomySpringer Science+Business Media · China | 1.32Q1 | 4.78 0.58 up from 2021 | 511 | 50% | $3,590 | ||
26SciPost Physics CoreOASciPost.org · Netherlands | 1.29Q1 | 3.56 0.53 up from 2021 | 64 | 100% | — | ||
27Physical Review AppliedAmerican Physical Society · United States | 1.29Q2 | 4.61 0.46 down from 2021 | 2,760 | 44% | — | ||
28Journal of Physics PhotonicsOAIOP Publishing · United Kingdom | 1.11Q2 | 3.96 0.58 up from 2021 | 227 | 100% | $2,700 | ||
29Frontiers in PhysicsOAFrontiers Media · Switzerland | 1.07Q2 | 3.37 0.84 down from 2021 | 1,599 | 100% | $3,077 | ||
30Journal of Computational ChemistryWiley · United States | 1.04Q2 | 3.22 0.73 down from 2021 | 633 | 41% | $4,520 | ||
31New Journal of PhysicsOAIOP Publishing · United Kingdom | 1.03Q2 | 3.15 0.56 down from 2021 | 1,988 | 100% | $2,610 | ||
32The European Physical Journal PlusSpringer Science+Business Media · Germany | 1.03Q2 | 3.41 0.64 down from 2021 | 2,848 | 26% | $3,890 | ||
33Annals of PhysicsElsevier BV · United States | 1.01Q2 | 2.56 0.35 down from 2021 | 672 | 57% | $3,160 | ||
34The Journal of Chemical PhysicsAmerican Institute of Physics · United States | 0.96Q2 | 4.42 0.15 up from 2021 | 6,060 | 54% | $3,500 | ||
35Ukrainian Journal of Physical OpticsOAUkraine | 0.91Q2 | 4.37 3.23 up from 2021 | 71 | 100% | — | ||
36Communications in Theoretical PhysicsInstitute of Physics · China | 0.87Q2 | 2.96 0.01 down from 2021 | 618 | 74% | — | ||
37Physical Review AAmerican Physical Society · United States | 0.85Q2 | 3.00 0.25 down from 2021 | 7,153 | 60% | $2,675 | ||
38Physics OpenOAElsevier BV · Netherlands | 0.85Q2 | 2.88 0.93 up from 2021 | 66 | 100% | $1,700 | ||
39Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part B Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern PhysicsElsevier BV · United Kingdom | 0.84Q2 | 1.79 0.39 down from 2021 | 84 | — | $2,700 | ||
40Physical review. B./Physical review. BAmerican Physical Society · United States | 0.84Q2 | 3.74 0.42 down from 2021 | 15,141 | 61% | — | ||
41Annual Review of Condensed Matter PhysicsAnnual Reviews · United States | 0.80Q2 | 11.82 9.15 down from 2021 | 52 | 96% | — | ||
42Color and Imaging ConferenceUnited States | 0.79Q2 | 0.37 0.05 down from 2021 | 171 | 83% | — | ||
43The Journal of Physical Chemistry AAmerican Chemical Society · United States | 0.77Q2 | 3.12 0.18 up from 2021 | 3,175 | 30% | — | ||
44Chinese Physics LettersInstitute of Physics · United Kingdom | 0.76Q2 | 3.33 1.13 up from 2021 | 788 | 80% | $2,500 | ||
45Structural DynamicsOAAIP Publishing · United States | 0.73Q2 | 2.59 0.56 down from 2021 | 150 | 100% | $2,200 | ||
46AtomsOAMultidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute · Switzerland | 0.72Q2 | 2.02 0.52 down from 2021 | 312 | 100% | $1,810 | ||
47Journal of Physics A Mathematical and TheoreticalInstitute of Physics · United Kingdom | 0.71Q2 | 1.97 0.24 down from 2021 | 1,562 | 90% | $3,325 | ||
48Physics Letters AElsevier BV | 0.71Q2 | 2.36 0.05 up from 2021 | 1,923 | 25% | $2,150 | ||
49Quantum ReportsOAMultidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute · Switzerland | 0.70Q2 | 2.05 0.45 down from 2021 | 117 | 100% | $1,689 | ||
50Annual Review of Physical ChemistryAnnual Reviews · United States | 0.70Q2 | 14.55 0.75 down from 2021 | 71 | 88% | — |
Subfields of Physics and Astronomy, with Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics highlighted.
- Astronomy and Astrophysics111
- Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics103
- Nuclear and High Energy Physics75
- Statistical and Nonlinear Physics44
- Radiation28
- Condensed Matter Physics7
- Acoustics and Ultrasonics0
- Instrumentation0
Journals
Citations made in 2022. Corpus-wide, 89.5% of core-journal articles and reviews published that year have at least one matched reference; the share varies by journal and field.
22 additional Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics journals with metrics are unranked under this release’s eligibility rules: a journal needs at least 30 citable documents in 2019–2021, 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: 2022. Publication window: 2019–2021. How these summaries are calculated
- Ranked journals
- 103
- Window papers (baseline)
- 110,326 -3.2% from indicator year 2019
- Median OJR
- 0.662 -12.3% from indicator year 2019
- Rising journals (2025)
- 5
Window papers are the baseline paper population: citable papers (articles, reviews and conference papers) from 2019–2021 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 | 57 | 64 | 62 | 65 | 65 | 66 | 68 | 70 | 70 | 73 | 72 | 71 | 78 | 81 | 85 | 87 | 89 | 91 | 92 | 97 | 105 | 103 | 103 | 108 | 107 | 105 | |
| Window papers (baseline) | 84,695 | 86,753 | 86,412 | 89,035 | 91,151 | 95,706 | 100,546 | 106,715 | 110,735 | 112,436 | 112,382 | 112,245 | 113,539 | 114,815 | 116,212 | 117,514 | 117,344 | 117,182 | 115,527 | 113,962 | 112,377 | 111,323 | 110,326 | 106,860 | 103,126 | 100,852 | |
| Median OJR | 0.710 | 0.60 | 0.59 | 0.642 | 0.640 | 0.77 | 0.807 | 0.783 | 0.89 | 0.86 | 0.84 | 0.95 | 0.83 | 0.778 | 0.82 | 0.813 | 0.79 | 0.80 | 0.76 | 0.75 | 0.706 | 0.67 | 0.662 | 0.68 | 0.657 | 0.70 |
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.