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PLOS Pathogens is Scopus-indexed (Q1, CiteScore 8.2), WoS SCIE, DOAJ. Published by Public Library of Science.
Checked against the index lists dated .
ISSN 1553-7366Verify ISSN ↗1553-7374Verify ISSN ↗
Publisher: Public Library of Science
Cost to publish: Checking DOAJ for article charges…
| Subject area | Rank | Pctile | Q |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parasitology | 5 / 82 | 94th | Q1 |
| Genetics | 53 / 357 | 85th | Q1 |
| Virology | 15 / 86 | 83rd | Q1 |
| Microbiology | 42 / 194 | 78th | Q1 |
| Immunology | 55 / 243 | 77th | Q1 |
| Molecular Biology | 103 / 414 | 75th | Q1 |
Not listed in: ABDC, ABS / AJG, FT50, UT Dallas, ONOS (subscription), ONOS (APC covered)
Yes — actively indexed in Scopus, coverage 2005–present, best quartile Q1, CiteScore 8.2.
PLOS Pathogens is Q1 in Parasitology (rank 5 of 82), Q1 in Genetics (rank 53 of 357) and Q1 in Virology (rank 15 of 86), by CiteScore 2025. It is ranked in 6 subject areas in all.
PLOS Pathogens is indexed in the Science Citation Index Expanded, so it may have a Journal Impact Factor in Clarivate's Journal Citation Reports. JCR is paid, so check it for the current value. The closest free measure is its Scopus CiteScore 8.2, which places it in quartile Q1 at the 94th percentile of its subject. Its SCImago Journal Rank (SJR, a free Scopus-based metric) is 1.932, quartile Q1, with an H-index of 274.
The publisher lists an article processing charge of about US$3,043 for open access (source: OpenAlex). Many journals also publish by the subscription route at no cost to the author, so confirm on the journal's own website.
PLOS Pathogens is published by Public Library of Science. Its print ISSN is 1553-7366 and its online ISSN is 1553-7374.
Yes — indexed in the Science Citation Index Expanded.
Yes — it is an open-access journal, listed in DOAJ.
PLOS Pathogens has an h-index of 321 and a 2-year mean of 5.37 citations per paper (OpenAlex). Its Scopus CiteScore is 8.2, quartile Q1. On 2-year citations it ranks #4 of 80 Scopus journals in Parasitology.
PLOS Pathogens published 767 papers in 2025; its busiest recent year was 2021 with 842. 2026* is the year so far.
h-index, i10-index and 2-year mean citedness are open, licence-clear metrics from OpenAlex — not a proprietary impact factor. The subject rank counts only journals that OpenAlex has a figure for; it is not a Scopus or Clarivate ranking. Updated 2026-10-14.
In its latest 97 research articles (2026), authors are most often from United States (29.5%), China (28.4%) and United Kingdom (6.4%).
Countries are counted fractionally, so a paper by authors from two countries counts half to each.
Scopus status: Active. 50 retracted papers are recorded (3.9 per 1,000 papers). The Problematic Paper Screener flags none of its papers. These are indicators to check, not findings against the journal.
Retractions from OpenAlex; flags from the Problematic Paper Screener (Cabanac, Labbé & Magazinov, CC BY), 2026-09-21 export. A flag marks a paper for a closer look; it is not a finding against the journal.
Index data is curated from public sources (Scopus, Web of Science, ABDC, FT50, UT Dallas, DOAJ). CiteScore and quartiles reflect the latest available Scopus release. Always verify a journal's current status on its official source before submitting.
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