How to spot a predatory journal before you submit

Predatory journals look like academic journals but do not provide the services that make publishing meaningful: real peer review, editing, indexing and long-term availability. They charge authors fees and publish almost anything. Papers published there are hard to find, may not count for career progression and are difficult to withdraw.

Ten warning signs

• Unsolicited emails praising your work and inviting you to submit.
• Promises of peer review and publication within days.
• Fees that are unclear or appear only after acceptance.
• A very broad scope, combining unrelated fields in one journal.
• Editorial board members who cannot be verified or did not agree to be listed.
• Claims of impact factors or metrics that cannot be confirmed with the issuing organisation.
• Claimed indexing that is not confirmed by the database itself.
• A name very similar to a well-known journal.
• No clear policies on peer review, ethics, corrections or licensing.
• Poorly edited published articles and a website with errors.

Simple checks that take ten minutes

• Look the journal up directly in the databases it claims, such as DOAJ, PubMed or Scopus.
• Confirm the ISSN in the ISSN Portal.
• Check membership claims, such as COPE, on the organisation’s own website.
• Read several published articles and judge their quality yourself.
• Ask a librarian or an experienced colleague.

Use a checklist

The Think. Check. Submit. initiative offers a short, practical checklist for evaluating journals and publishers. It is a good habit for every submission, not only when something feels wrong.

If you have already submitted

Write to the journal and withdraw the manuscript formally, keep copies of all correspondence, and do not pay any fee until you are sure. If the paper has been published without your agreement, ask your institution’s library or research office for help.

Not sure about a journal? Our team can review it with you before you submit. Contact us.