Which Journals Have the Highest Impact Factor?

Every researcher knows that Nature and Science dominate academic publishing, but the full landscape of high-impact-factor journals is far more varied and field-specific than a two-journal shortlist suggests. Understanding which journals consistently achieve the highest IFs — and why — helps you calibrate your submission strategy, benchmark your target journals, and understand what you are competing with when you aim for the top tier. 

This guide covers the highest-IF journals across every major discipline, explains the structural reasons behind exceptionally high scores, and gives you practical guidance on whether targeting them makes sense for your work. 

The Absolute Pinnacle: Multidisciplinary Giants 

 A small group of journals dominate the very top of global IF rankings because they publish across all scientific disciplines, drawing citations from every field simultaneously. 

Nature (IF ~60–70) 

Founded in 1869, Nature publishes original research across all scientific disciplines. Its IF reflects both its prestige and its enormous cross-disciplinary citation pool. Every scientific community cites Nature, while most journals are cited only within their own field. Acceptance rate: approximately 7–8%. 

Science (IF ~55–65) 

Published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Science is Nature’s closest rival in prestige and IF. Its interdisciplinary reach inflates its IF far above any discipline-specific journal. Acceptance rate: approximately 7%. 

Nature Communications (IF ~16–18) 

The open-access sibling of Nature, publishing across all natural sciences. Its IF is substantially lower than Nature but exceptional in absolute terms, and its broader scope means more papers find a home here. 

Highest Impact Factor Journals in Medicine and Clinical Research 

Clinical medicine produces the highest absolute IF scores of any specific discipline, driven by the enormous size of the global medical research community and the clinical urgency that drives rapid citation. 

Journal	Approximate IF	Notes
The Lancet	~170	Surged during COVID-19; flagship general medical journal
JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association)	~120	US-based flagship clinical journal
New England Journal of Medicine	~130	Historically the most cited clinical journal
BMJ (British Medical Journal)	~100	UK-based flagship; very high open-access reach
Nature Medicine	~80	Biomedical research bridging basic and clinical science
CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians	~250+	Highest IF of any specialty journal; review-heavy

 

CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians consistently records one of the highest IFs of any journal in existence — driven by its comprehensive review articles that serve as reference texts for oncologists worldwide. 

Highest Impact Factor Journals in Biology and Life Sciences 

Journal	Approximate IF
Cell	~68
Nature Genetics	~41
Nature Methods	~36
Nature Cell Biology	~28
Immunity	~32
Molecular Cell	~18
PLOS Biology	~9

 

Cell biology and genetics are citation-dense fields with large, well-funded research communities. Cell has long been the flagship of molecular biology, consistently publishing transformative discoveries. 

Highest Impact Factor Journals in Chemistry 

Journal	Approximate IF	Type
Chemical Reviews	~52	Review journal
Chemical Society Reviews	~40	Review journal
Nature Chemistry	~26	Original research
Angewandte Chemie	~16	Original research
Journal of the American Chemical Society (JACS)	~17	Original research
ACS Nano	~17	Nanoscience and materials

 

 Chemical Reviews and Chemical Society Reviews have exceptional IFs because they publish authoritative review articles that are cited as field-wide reference texts. Their IFs are not representative of what you should expect from original research chemistry journals. 

Highest Impact Factor Journals in Physics 

Journal	Approximate IF	Notes
Reviews of Modern Physics	~45	Authoritative reviews; widely cited as references
Nature Physics	~19	Original research across physics
Physical Review X	~14	High-impact original research
npj Quantum Information	~12	Quantum computing
Advanced Materials	~27	Straddles physics and materials science
Physical Review Letters	~8	Core physics research journal

 

Reviews of Modern Physics is a significant outlier because it publishes comprehensive authoritative reviews that serve as citation anchors across the entire field for decades. 

Highest Impact Factor Journals by Other Major Disciplines 

Environmental Science and Climate 

• Nature Climate Change: ~36 
• Global Change Biology: ~13 
• Environmental Science and Technology: ~12 

 Neuroscience 

• Nature Neuroscience: ~20 
• Neuron: ~18 
• Brain: ~14 
• Journal of Neuroscience: ~7 

 Engineering 

• Nature Energy: ~56 (exceptional outlier) 
• Progress in Polymer Science: ~22 
• IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks: ~14 

 Psychology 

• Psychological Bulletin: ~18 
• Perspectives on Psychological Science: ~14 
• Psychological Review: ~12 

 Economics and Social Sciences 

• American Economic Review: ~7 
• Journal of Economic Perspectives: ~10 
• Journal of Financial Economics: ~8 

Why Some Journals Have Extraordinarily High Impact Factors 

Three structural factors drive unusually high IF scores: 

1.  Interdisciplinary reach. Journals publishing across multiple fields accumulate citations from every corner of science, multiplying their citation pool far beyond what any specialist journal can achieve. Nature and Science are cited by researchers in fields that have nothing to do with the originalpaper’stopic. 
2.  High proportion of review articles. Review articles attract citations from researchers who have not read every underlying paper. A comprehensive review in Nature Reviews Cancer may receive 500 citations within a year. Journals that publish more reviews have structurally higher IFs.
3. Prestige feedback loop. High-prestige journals attract the best papers, which generate the most citations, which sustain the high IF — a self-reinforcing cycle. The top journals have been building this cycle for decades.

Discipline-Specific Considerations for High-IF Journal Targeting 

High-Impact Factor Journals in Interdisciplinary Research 

Researchers working at the intersection of disciplines face a unique challenge: their work may fit multiple subject categories and could potentially target journals from several fields. When evaluating high-IF options for interdisciplinary work: 

•  Identify which community most needs to know about your findings and which will be most likely to cite it 
• A bioengineering paper aimed at clinicians should target clinical journals with high IF in that specialty, not general bioengineering journals 
• A computational biology paper with implications for data science should consider whether the primary IF target is biology or computer science, based on which citation community would generate the most impact 

 High-IF interdisciplinary journals like Nature Methods, Cell Systems, or Nature Computational Science specifically serve researchers in hybrid fields — their elevated IFs reflect the merger of multiple citation pools.

Understanding Why Review Journals Have the Highest IFs 

The journals with the very highest impact factors in many fields — Chemical Reviews (IF ~52), Reviews of Modern Physics (IF ~45), CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians (IF ~250+) — are almost exclusively review journals. This is not coincidental. 

Review articles serve as reference hubs: researchers who need to cite the background of a field cite reviews because they summarise entire bodies of work. A single authoritative review may be cited in the introduction of thousands of subsequent papers, whereas the underlying original research papers each accumulate only a fraction of those citations individually. 

 This creates an important practical consideration: the impact factor of a review-focused journal is not directly comparable to an original research journal in the same field. A biochemistry review journal with IF 40 and a biochemistry research journal with IF 8 are not separated by a factor of 5 in terms of the quality of original research they publish — they are structurally different publication types serving different functions in the literature. 

When selecting a target journal for original research, compare against other original research journals, not against review journals. 

Practical Framework: Should You Target a High-IF Journal? 

Use this decision matrix to evaluate any submission decision involving a high-IF target. 

Question	Yes →	No →
Is my finding genuinely significant beyond my subfield?	Consider high-IF generalist	Target Q1 specialist
Does my paper have broad readership appeal?	High-IF generalist viable	Q1 specialist preferable
Can I wait 4–8+ months for probable rejection?	High-IF attempt worthwhile	Skip to Q1 specialist
Have I written this for a broad scientific audience?	Ready to submit	Revise introduction first
Does my paper match the journal's recent content?	Strong scope fit	Weak scope fit — reconsider

 

A paper that scores “yes” on all five is a genuine high-IF candidate. A paper that scores “no” on two or more belongs in a Q1 specialist journal for that specific area. 

Should You Target the Highest-IF Journal Possible? 

Not necessarily. There are critical practical considerations: 

 Acceptance Rates Are Extremely Low 

• Nature: accepts approximately 7–8% of submissions 
• Science: approximately 7% 
• The Lancet: approximately 5% 
• NEJM: approximately 5% 
• Cell: approximately 5–7% 

 These journals also have high desk rejection rates — Nature and Science reject an estimated 60–70% of submissions before peer review. Spending 3–6 months waiting for a predictable rejection delays publication significantly. 

 The Significance Bar Is Different 

 High-IF journals do not simply seek technically correct research. They seek research of broad, field-transforming significance that will interest a wide readership. This is a fundamentally different standard than technical correctness, and it disqualifies most submitted manuscripts not because of their quality but because of their scope. 

Field-Appropriate Expectations 

 A paper about a specialised technique in a specific cell type will not be accepted by Nature regardless of its quality. It does not belong there — it belongs in a specialist Q1 journal in its field, where it will be read by the right audience and accumulate more relevant citations. 

 Practical Decision Framework 

 Target a high-IF generalist journal when: 

• Your findings have genuine broad significance beyond your field 
• The implications are understandable to a multidisciplinary audience 
• You can withstand a 3–6 month wait for what may be desk rejection 
• You have strong preliminary data for a compelling executive summary 

 Target a high-IF specialist journal when: 

• Your findings are field-leading within a specific discipline 
• The paper fits the exact scope of a Q1 specialist journal 
• Your timeline favours the higher acceptance probability of specialist journals 

How to Find Current Impact Factor Rankings 

The most reliable free resource is scimago.org, which provides SJR rankings and quartile data for over 27,000 journals. For official JIF data, the Journal Citation Reports at Clarivate requires institutional access — most universities provide this. 

 For the highest-IF journals within your specific category, search JCR by subject category and sort by impact factor. This gives you the ranked list of all journals in your field, from which you can identify the top tier you should realistically target. 

 

Frequently Asked Questions 

Which journal has the highest impact factor in the world? 

 CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians has consistently recorded one of the highest IFs of any journal (often exceeding 250), driven by its comprehensive review articles. Among general science journals, The Lancet, NEJM, and JAMA regularly exceed 100. Nature and Science typically sit in the 55–70 range. 

Which journal has the highest impact factor in medicine? 

 The Lancet (~170) and CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians (~250+) typically lead. NEJM (~130), JAMA (~120), and BMJ (~100) are also consistently at the elite tier. 

Are high-impact-factor journals worth targeting? 

For research of genuinely broad significance, yes. For specialist work, a Q1 journal in your field is more appropriate and more likely to reach the right readers. Targeting the highest IF journal for work that belongs in a specialist venue wastes time and does not serve your career or your readers. 

What is the highest impact factor journal in biology?

Cell (~68) is the flagship of molecular and cell biology. Nature Genetics (~41), Nature Methods (~36), and Immunity (~32) are among the other elite titles in the life sciences.

Which journal has the highest impact factor overall?

 CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians consistently reports one of the highest IFs of any journal, often exceeding 250, driven by its comprehensive review articles. Among general science journals, The Lancet, NEJM, and JAMA regularly exceed 100. Nature and Science typically sit in the 55–70 range. 

What is the top journal in biology by impact factor? 

 Cell (~68) is the flagship of cell and molecular biology. Nature Genetics (~41), Nature Methods (~36), and Immunity (~32) are among the other elite titles in the broader life sciences. 

Are high-IF journals worth targeting for all researchers? 

 No. High-IF generalist journals are appropriate for work with genuinely broad significance. For specialised research, a Q1 specialist journal in your exact area is more appropriate and more likely to reach the right readers and accumulate relevant citations. 

Why do some journals have higher IFs than others in the same field? 

The primary drivers are: breadth of scope (journals covering more topics attract citations from more of the field), proportion of review articles (reviews attract far more citations than original research), community size (larger fields generate more total citations), and historical prestige (high-ranking journals attract the best papers, which generate the most citations, sustaining the cycle). 

Can a newer journal compete with established high-IF journals? 

Over time, yes. Several journals that launched in the 2010s — including Nature Communications, eLife, and PLOS Biology — have built strong IFs by attracting high-quality submissions through open access policies, strong editorial boards, and fast review processes. Building to elite IF levels typically takes 10–20 years of sustained quality. 

Conclusion 

The journals with the highest absolute impact factors — Nature, The Lancet, NEJM, Cell — are extraordinary outliers driven by interdisciplinary reach, large audiences, and decades of compounding prestige. For most researchers, the relevant question is not which journals have the globally highest IF, but which journals have the strongest standing within your own field. Use JCR quartile rankings, subject-category benchmarks, and scope fit alongside raw IF numbers. Target the best-fit journal for your paper’s significance level — that decision will serve your career and your readers far better than chasing maximum IF.

Useful guides for researchers choosing journals

These PubScholars resources will help you go deeper on impact factor:

What is journal impact factor? — the complete foundational guide covering what JIF means, how it is used, and its limitations

What is a good impact factor for a journal? — field-by-field benchmarks for medicine, biology, chemistry, physics, and social sciences

How is journal impact factor calculated? — the official formula, citation windows, citable items, and three worked examples