Regardless of any controversies surrounding it, indexing does have some benefits for both journals and authors. The most useful being the ability to confirm a journal isn’t a predatory publication. With predatory publishing on the rise, it’s nice to have an easy way of checking the legitimacy of journals. And the more obvious benefit is certainly added credibility for authors publishing in indexed journals. Read on to see the steps to determine the indexing status of a journal:

National Library of Medicine (NLM)/MEDLINE

1. Go to https://ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog
2. Make sure “NLM Catalog” is selected in the dropdown and type the journal’s ISSN in the search box.
   1. To search for the journal title, click on Advanced Search, select Journal from the first Builder dropdown, and then type in the journal name.
3. If the search results bring up the journal you’re looking for, it’s in the National Library of Medicine (NLM) catalog.
4. Included in the journal details is the Current Indexing Status; an indexed journal will show as “Currently indexed for MEDLINE”

PubMed Central (PMC)

Note that only Gold Open Access journals are indexed in PMC.

1. Go to https://ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/journals
2. Type the journal title on the search box below the “PMC Journal List” header.
3. On the search result page, the indexed journal will display “Full” in the “Participation level” column.

Web of Science

1. Go to https://mjl.clarivate.com/home
2. Type the journal title or ISSN in the search box and click on “Search Journals.”
3. On the search result page, if the journal is indexed, you will see “Web of Science Core Collection: Science Citation Index Expanded” in addition to any other WoS indices the journal may be included in.

Scopus

1. Go to https://scopus.com/sources
2. Select “Title” or “ISSN” from the dropdown arrow, type the selected information, and click on the “Find sources” button.
3. From the search result, click on the title of the journal you’re looking for.
4. If the journal is indexed, “Scopus coverage years” will show.

Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ)

Note that only Gold Open Access journals are indexed in DOAJ.

1. Go to https://doaj.org
2. Select “Journals” above the search box and type in the title or ISSN of the journal you’re interested in.
3. If the journal is indexed, it will appear on the search result page.

From How to Check if a Journal is Indexed, Asad Naveed, https://asadnaveed.substack.com/p/how-to-check-if-a-journal-is-indexed

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