Is the journal relevant to your research audience?

Consider:

• The relevance of the scope and audience of the journal.
• Is your article adding to a conversation occurring in the journal? Are you citing articles from that journal?
• Is the journal peer reviewed?  Ulrichsweb Global Serials Directory lists peer reviewed journals in your discipline. It is useful if your research is cross disciplinary and you are not familiar with potential journals in related areas.
• Ranked Journal Lists by Discipline.
  • Australian Business Deans Council (ABDC) Journal Quality List.  The list is divided into four categories of quality denoted as A*, A, B, C. It is a journal quality list ranking journals in 15 sub-disciplines in business, economics and law.
  • Association of Business Schools Academic Journal Quality Guide.
  • Australian Political Studies Association (APSA)   Updated preferred journal rankings for the 1606 and 1605 FOR codes by APSA.
  • ERIHPLUS  European Reference Index for the Humanities and Social Sciences.
  • Core Rankings Portal Computing Research and Education Association of Australasia publications in Computer Science and Information Technology.
• Using Scopus or Web of Science to find journals with highly cited articles on your topic.
• The CSU Research Outputs Collection (ROC) criteria for journals.

When considering the quality of appropriate journals in which to publish your research include:

• Is it peer-reviewed? – What is the process and the prestige of the editorial team or contributors?
• Is it indexed in major indexes (Scopus, Web-of-Science, Medline …)
• What are the journal policies for ethics, data deposits and reporting schemas (clinical trials registrations, data sharing)
• Look at Citations in: 
  • Web-of-Science
  • Scopus
• CiteScore can help you evaluate journals, book series, conference proceedings, and trade journals.
• Use SCImago Journal and Country Rank to compare journals in most disciplines. SCImago illustrates Journal quality or ranks, often determined through the use of metrics.
• The journal's inclusion in the Excellence in Research Australia (ERA) List of Eligible Journals
• The relevance of the journal to the discipline. Will the article reach the desired audience?

Keep in mind that some research disciplines can be disadvantaged by reliance on metrics alone. For more information on how to evaluate and compare journals and their metrics see Journal Ranking on our Research Metrics, Impact and Engagement Guide.

Check the publishers website for:

• Journal acceptance rates
• Time taken for peer review
• Time taken to publish accepted articles

Discoverability

Is the journal:

• Indexed in Scopus, Web of Science, CABI, ABI/Inform or another reputable database?  Non indexed journals are less visible to the international research community.
• Included in the Ulrichsweb Global Serials Directory? The Ulrichs directory will indicate the online availability of Journals in a range of scholarly databases.
• Available in full text online and can the full text content be accessed by the intended audience?