SCImago Journal Rank
The SCImago Journal Rank (SJR) is a size-independent bibliometric indicator that measures the scientific prestige and visibility of scholarly journals by calculating the average prestige per article, based on weighted citations received from other journals over a three-year period.[1][2] Developed by the SCImago research group—a collaboration of the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) and Spanish universities including the Universities of Granada, Extremadura, Carlos III of Madrid, and Alcalá—SJR adapts the Google PageRank™ algorithm to transfer prestige through citation networks, where citations from higher-prestige journals carry more weight than those from lower-prestige ones.[1][2] SJR draws exclusively from citation data in the Scopus® database, which, as of 2025, covers approximately 28,000 active titles from over 7,000 international publishers since 1996, enabling comparisons across 27 major scientific domains and 334 specific subject categories.[1][3] The indicator's calculation involves an iterative process: initially, all journals receive equal prestige; subsequent iterations redistribute prestige proportionally based on incoming citations, normalized by the total outgoing citations from each citing journal, until convergence is achieved (typically when changes fall below a predefined threshold).[2] The core formula for a journal's SJR in iteration i is:\text{SJR}_i = \left[ d \cdot \sum \left( \frac{C_{ji}}{C_j} \cdot \text{SJR}_j \right) \right] + \frac{(1 - d - e)}{N} + \left[ e \cdot \frac{\text{Art}_i}{\text{Global Articles}} \right] + \left[ d \cdot \sum (\text{Dangling Nodes Prestige}) \cdot \frac{\text{Art}_i}{\text{Global Articles}} \right]
where d = 0.85 (damping factor), e = 0.10 (random prestige factor), C_{ji} is citations from journal j to i, C_j is total references from j, N is the number of journals, and \text{Art}_i is articles in journal i.[2] Self-citations are included but weighted proportionally within the total references of the citing journal, ensuring they do not disproportionately inflate prestige.[2] Introduced in 2007 through the publicly accessible SCImago Journal & Country Rank portal, SJR provides annual rankings that divide journals into four quartiles (Q1 for the top 25% by prestige, down to Q4), with a "best quartile" denoting a journal's highest achieved position across categories.[1][4] Unlike impact factor metrics, SJR accounts for the quality of citations rather than sheer volume, making it particularly useful for cross-disciplinary evaluations and identifying influential outlets in fields like science, technology, medicine, social sciences, and humanities.[2] The portal's open access facilitates global use by researchers, institutions, and policymakers for assessing journal performance and scientific output.[1]