Scopus Training Module 3: Metrics

Scopus allows researchers to analyze the journals contained in its database based on a variety of metrics on the "Analytics" page. Up to 10 journals can also be compared based on these same metrics in either chart or tabular form.

Click on Compare sources to compare up to 10 Scopus sources on a variety of parameters, including those outlined above. The journal analyzer includes data from 1996 to the current year. When citations are calculated for a source, documents published before 1996 are not included, because complete citation information for documents published prior to 1996 is not available in Scopus. The analyzer is available in both a line chart and a table view. The line chart displays information in a line graph, with separate graphs for each parameter. The table lists parameters together in one table.

CiteScore is another metric for measuring journal impact in Scopus. The calculation of CiteScore for the current year is based on the number of citations received by a journal in that year for the documents published in the journal in the past three years, divided by the documents indexed in Scopus published in those three years. This is how CiteScore of 2018 is calculated:​

Calculation of CiteScore in the Year 2018:

Note: CiteScore includes all document types indexed in Scopus, e.g. articles, reviews, letters, notes, editorials and conference papers.

CiteScore metrics are a family of 8 indicators, include: CiteScore, CiteScore Tracker, CiteScore Percentile, CiteScore Quartiles, CiteScore Rank, Citation Count, Document Count and Percentage Cited.

• CiteScore Tracker provides a current review of how a journal is performing during the course of the year. It is updated every month.
• CiteScore Percentile indicates how a journal ranks relative to other journals in the same subject field. (The fields are defined according to the Scopus field definitions).

SJR (SCImago Journal Rank):

• ranks publications by weighted citations per document.
• is a prestige metric based on the idea that not all citations are the same. Citations are weighted more or weighted less – depending on the source they come from.
• with SJR, subject field, quality and reputation of the journal have a direct effect on the value of a citation.
• with SJR, self-citations are limited to the maximum of 33%.

SNIP (Source Normalized Impact per Paper):

• measures contextual citation impact by weighting citations based on the total number of citations in a subject field. The impact of a single citation is given higher value in subject areas where citations are less likely, and vice versa. For example, journals in Mathematics, Engineering and Social Sciences tend to have higher values than titles in Life Sciences.
• allows direct comparison of sources in different subject fields.
• with SNIP, the differences of journals’ SNIP are due to the quality of the journals but not the different citation behavior between subject fields.