Abstract
Updated Aug 2, 104: This table is the web’s most complete list of open-access ophthalmology, optometry, and vision science journals. Journals are categorized by language, impact factor,whether they are Medline-indexed, available in PubMedCentral, require author processing fees, and other facts. NEWS AND UPDATES AT BOTTOM OF PAGE.
UPDATED May 3, 2015: Christopher T. Leffler, MD, MPH. Scientists want their findings to be widely known through publication. The conventional wisdom in academia is that one wants to publish in the journal with the highest impact factor, which is based on the number of citations the average article in the journal receives. Traditionally, the journals with the highest impact factor were likely to have the highest distribution and the widest availability. Today, the internet has turned this situation on its head, because anyone can publish anything to a worldwide audience instantaneously. The open access internet is the platform with the widest availability. As of this writing, in March 2011, there are estimated to be 6.9 billion people on our planet, and 2.0 billion are estimated to have internet access. This number is exploding with the introduction of smartphones. No academic journal has adistribution close to this. But in order to help people findyour work amid all the clutter of the internet, it helps to have it in an academic journal pointed to by Medline, and it still doesn’t hurt if the journal has a high impact factor. The ideal journal would be Medline-indexed, archived in PubmedCentral, with no author processing fees, available immediately, in full-text html (as opposed to just pdf format), with a high impact factor. Here are some open-access journals of interest in ophthalmology, optometry, and vision science. The table lists English-language journals free for the author, followed by those for which the author pays, and then journals not permitting English articles. Within each section, the highest-impact journals are listed first, followed by Pubmedcentral journals, followed by Medline-indexed journals, and then non-Medline-indexed journals.
| Journal Title. | Medline-indexed? | In Pubmed Central? | Free for author? | Notes: |
| ****FREE FOR AUTHOR*** | ||||
| JAMA Ophthalmology | Yes | No | Yes | 1 year delay before open access. Impact factor 3.71 in 2012. |
| Acta Ophthalmologica | Yes | No | Yes. Can pay to unlock immediately. | 1 year delay before open access. Impact factor 2.63 in 2012. |
| Molecular Vision | Yes | Yes | Yes | ARVO. Impact factor 2.21 in 2012. |
| Eye (London) | Yes | Yes | Yes | 1-2 year delay before open access.Impact factor 1.85 in 2012. |
| Optometry and Vision Science | Yes | No | Yes | 1 year delay for open access. Impact factor 2.11 in 2012. |
| Journal of Neuro-Ophthalmology | Yes | No | Yes | 1 year delay for open access. pdf format only. Impact factor 1.45 in 2012. |
| Clinical and Experimental Optometry | Yes | No | Yes | 2 year delaybefore open access. Impact factor 1.05 in 2012. |
| Indian Journal of Ophthalmology | Yes | Yes | Yes | Gives hit counts on website. Impact factor 1.02 in 2012. |
| Digital Journal of Ophthalmology | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Community Eye Health Journal | Yes | Yes | Yes | Educational articles on the developing world. Not peer-reviewed original research. |
| Middle East African Journal of Ophthalmology | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Oman Journal of Ophthalmology | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Journal of Ophthalmic and Vision Research | Yes | Yes | Yes | English. Iran. Peer-reviewed original research. |
| Saudi Journal of Ophthalmology | Yes. | Yes. | Yes. | Saudi Ophthalmological Society. |
| Journal of Optometry | Yes | Yes | Yes | English. Spanish General Council of Optometrists. |
| Bulletin of the Belgian Society of Ophthalmology | Yes | No | Yes? | English or French. pdf format. |
| Arquivos Brasileiros de Oftalmologia | Yes | No | Yes | English or Portuguese |
| Nepalese Journal of Ophthalmology | Yes | No | Yes | |
| Not In Medline: | ||||
| Optometry and Visual Performance | No | No | Yes | Optometric Extension Program Foundation. |
| Historia Ophthalmologica Internationalis (histoph.com) | No. | No. | Yes. | |
| Journal of Academic Ophthalmology | No | No | Yes | Does have peer-reviewed original research on resident training, policies, etc. |
| Journal of Behavioral Optometry | No | No | Yes | Peer-reviewed original research.Looks legitimate. |
| The South African Optometrist | No | No | Yes | Peer-reviewed original research. |
| Journal of Ophthalmic Photography | No | No | Yes | pdf downloads. Peer-reviewed original research. |
| Optometric Education | No | No | Yes | U.S. Assoc Schools and Colleges Optometry.Peer-reviewed original research. |
| Optometry and Vision Development | No | No | Yes | College of Optometrists and Vision Development.Peer-reviewed original research. Vision therapy and rehabilitation |
| Online Journals of Ophthalmology | No | No | Yes | English or German. Peer-reviewed original research. |
| Iranian Journal of Ophthalmology | No | No | Yes | English. Peer-reviewed original research. |
| GMS Ophthalmology Cases | No | No | Yes | Launched Sep 2011. Published by “German Medical Science”, the portal of the Assoc of Scientific Medical Societies. |
| Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology | No | No | Yes | |
| NO PEER-REVIEWED ORIGINAL RESEARCH. | ||||
| Review of Ophthalmology | No | No | Yes | news/reviews |
| Ophthalmology Times | No | No | Yes | news/reviews. |
| Eye World | No | No | Yes | news/reviews. Am Soc Cat Refract Surg. |
| Ocular Surgery News | No | No | Yes | news/reviews. |
| Cataract and Refractive Surgery Today | No | No | Yes | news/reviews. |
| Refractive Eyecare | No | No | Yes | news/reviews. |
| Ophthalmology Management | No | No | Yes | news/reviews. |
| Review of Optometry | No | No | Yes | news/reviews. |
| Optometric Management | No | No | Yes | news/reviews. |
| Contact Lens Spectrum | No | No | Yes | news/reviews |
| Optometry Today | No | No | Yes | news/reviews |
| Primary Care Optometry News | No | No | Yes | news/reviews. |
| Eyecare Business | No | No | Yes | news/reviews |
| Baltic Eye | No | No | Yes | Mostly news/reviews. Some research. |
| ***AUTHOR PAYS*** | ||||
| PLoS One | Yes | Yes | No. $1350 USD as of May 2015. | Impact factor 3.53 in 2013/14. Gives hit counts for website and PMC. |
| Investigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science | Yes | No | No. | 1 year delay before open access. Impact factor 3.60 in 2012. |
| Journal of Vision | Yes | No | No, $85/page | U.S., ARVO. Impact factor 3.38 in 2012. |
| British Journal of Ophthalmology | Yes | Yes | No. $2200 to make article open access. | Impact Factor 2.90 in 2012. |
| Graefe’s Archive for Clinical and Experimental Ophthalmology | Yes | No. | No. Must pay to unlock. | Impact Factor 2.17 in 2012. Springer. |
| Journal of Ocular Pharmacology and Therapeutics | Yes. | No. | No. Hybrid Journal: Open access costs $3000 for first article, $2000 for subsequent. | Published by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. Journal ofthe Association of Ocular Pharmacology and Therapeutics. Impact Factor 1.51 in 2012. |
| BMC Ophthalmology | Yes | Yes | No. $2145 USD in May 2015. | Author gets hit counts from website but not PMC. Impact factor 1.08 in 2015. |
| Ophthalmologica | Yes | No | No. Hybrid Journal: Open access costs $3000 for first article, $2000 for subsequent. | Published by Karger. Impact factor 1.42 in 2012. |
| Ophthalmic Research | Yes | No | No. Hybrid Journal: Open access costs “CHF 3,000 (Swiss Francs)”=about $2600 USD today. | Published by Karger. Impact factor 1.56 in 2012. |
| Ophthalmic and Physiological Optics | Yes. | No. | No. Hybrid Journal. Costs $3000 for open access. | Impact factor 1.58 in 2012. |
| International Journal of Ophthalmology | Yes | Yes | No. $700 USD as of Aug. 2014 “depending on the quality of the article”, per the editor. | From China. Articles published in both English and Chinese. Gives hit counts for website but not PMC. |
| Journal of Ophthalmic Inflammation and Infection | Yes. | Yes. | No. $1600. | |
| Journal of Ocular Biology Diseases and Informatics | Yes | Yes | Presumably unlocking article carries an author fee. Website unclear. | As of May 2015, has not published since 2012. |
| Case Reports in Ophthalmology | Yes | Yes | No. $730/case report (Sep 2013). | |
| Clinical Ophthalmology (Auckland, NZ) | Yes | Yes | No. $1865/article (Sep 2013). | Lists hit counts for website and PMC. |
| Journal of Ophthalmology | Yes | Yes | No. $2000/research or review article (May 2015). | U.S., Hindawi Publishing. Impact factor 1.935 for 2013/2014. Hit counts not given, as far as I know. |
| Korean Journal of Ophthalmology | Yes | Yes | No? Unclear to me from their website. | |
| Open Ophthalmology Journal | Yes | Yes | No. $800/research article. $900/review (Sep 2013). | U.S., Bentham. No hit counts given. |
| Ophthalmology and Eye Diseases | Yes. | Yes. | No. $1848 as of May 2015. | New Zealand, Libertas Academia. Lists hit counts from pubmed and website. Impact factor 0.00 as of May 2015. |
| Case Reports in Ophthalmological Medicine. | Yes. | Yes. | No, $300 per case report. | Hindawi Publishing. |
| ISRN Ophthalmology | Yes. | Yes. | No. $600 per article in May 2015. | Hindawi Publishing. No hit counts. |
| Medical Hypothesis, Discovery and Innovation in Ophthalmology (MEHDI). | Yes. | Yes. | No. | Iran. pdf text only. No hit counts. |
| Ophthalmology and Therapy. | Yes. | Yes. | No. $320 per page, as of May 2015. | Springer. No hit counts. |
| Seminars in Ophthalmology | Yes | No | No. Must pay to unlock. Web site doesn’t list price. | InformaHealthcare is publisher. |
| Strabismus | Yes | No. | No. Must pay to unlock. Web site doesn’t list price. | InformaHealthcare is publisher. |
| Visual Neuroscience | Yes | No | No. Hybrid journal–costs $2700 for open access. They do allow you to post on your own website for free. | Cambridge University press is publisher. |
| International Ophthalmology | Yes | No | No. Must pay to unlock. | Springer. |
| Not In Medline: | ||||
| Internet Journal of Ophthalmology and Visual Science | No | No | No. $275 charge to author if accepted (as of Aug 2014). Lower than most other journals. | |
| World Journal of Ophthalmology | No. | No. | No. $600 US. | Chinese publisher, but international editorial board. |
| Clinical Optometry | No | No | No | Dovepress |
| Eye and Brain | No | No | No | Dovepress |
| Journal of Clinical and Experimental Ophthalmology | No | No | No | U.S. Omics Publishing Group. |
| Eye Reports | No | No | No | Brand new, as of March 14, 2011. |
| ***SPANISH JOURNALS:**** | ||||
| Archivos de la Sociedad Espanola de Oftalmologia | Yes | No | Yes | Spanish-only. |
| Revista Mexicana de Oftalmologia | No | No | Yes | Spanish-only. |
| Revista Cubana de Oftalmologia | No | No | Yes | Spanish-only. |
| Annals de Oftalmologia | No | No | Yes | Spanish-only. |
| Archivos de la Sociedad Canaria de Oftalmologia | No | No | Yes | Spanish-only. |
| Boletin de la Sociedad Oftalmologica de Madrid | No | No | Yes | Spanish-only. |
| Oftalmologia Clinica y Experimental | No | No | Yes. | Spanish-only. From Argentina. |
| Gaceta de Optometria | No | No | Yes | Spanish-only. |
| Oftalmologica Santa Lucia | No | No | Yes | Spanish-only. |
| ***FRENCH JOURNALS:**** | Also see: Bulletin Societe Belge Ophthalmologia in English/bilingual section. | |||
| Journal Francais d’Ophtalmologie | Yes | No | Yes | French-only. 2 year delay before open access. |
| ***PORTUGUESE JOURNALS:*** | Also see: Arquivos Brasileiros de Oftalmologiain English/bilingual section. | |||
| Revista Brasileira de Oftalmologia | No | No | No | Portuguese-only. |
| ***GERMAN JOURNALS:*** | Also see: Online Journals of Ophthalmologyin English/bilingual section. | |||
| Euro Focus Net-News | No | No | Yes | German-only. News/Reviews. No peer-reviewed original research. |
| ***OTHER LANGUAGES:*** | ||||
| International Journal of Ophthalmology | Yes | Yes | No. $700USD as of Aug 2014 “depending on the quality of the article.” | From China. Articles in both English and Chinese. |
| Turkish Journal ofOphthalmology | No | No | Yes | Turkish-only. Peer-reviewed original research. |
| Oftal’mohirugia | No | No | Yes | Russian only. Russian Society of Ophthalmologists. |
| Bina Journal of Ophthalmology | No | No | Yes | Farsi only. Iran. pdf only. |
Some journals, such as BMC Ophthalmology, permit institutional memberships. So if your university has a membership, submission would be discounted. If your vision-related paper overlaps with another field, you may also consider publishing in that field, as well (e.g. a paper on diabetic retinopathy might be publishable in a diabetes journal or a public health journal). You can find these journals by looking at the website “Directory of Open Access Journals,” pubmedcentral, or, if you’ve really got time on your hands, searching through all the journal titles in pubmed.org. Good luck! Notes/News: May 6, 2011. The Canadian Journal of Ophthalmology used to be open access pdf, with free author submission. However, it now looks like they are going to non-open access for full-text downloads outside of Canada in Sep 2011. So I have removed them from the above list. If you have any information on this, put it in the comment box below. July 3, 2011. ISRN Ophthalmololgy (see link in table above) is newly launching from Hindawi publishing. As a new journal, they are not charging author submission fees. I assume this will eventually change. July 11, 2011. I added the Journal of Ophthalmic Inflammation and Infection, which has been publishing since 2010. July 20, 2011. Journal of Ophthalmology running special issue on “Challenging cataracts, including pediatric cataracts” with deadline for article submission of Aug 15, 2011. September, 19, 2011.The Open Journal of Ophthalmology islooking for Editorial Board members to serve initial one-year terms (three-years for editor-in-chief).Send your questions or application (including yourresearch areasandresume) to ojoph@scirp.org. October 20, 2011. GMS Ophthalmology Cases is a new journal. See the table above. October 31, 2011. Case Reports in OphthalmologicalMedicine is a new journal. See the table above. November 21, 2011. The special issue “Chronic Migraine,”will be published in Headache Research and Treatment in July 2012. Deadline for submission: January 13th, 2012.December 5, 2011. The Journal of Ophthalmology is doing aspecial issue on eye trauma. (Disclosure: I am the lead Guest Editor.) The deadline for submission is March 16, 2012, with papers to be published in August of 2012. We are looking for papers addressing advances as well as clinical controversies. In addition to the topics listed in the call for papers (nonaccidental trauma in children (How do we really know if these hemorrhages are nonaccidental?), hyphema in sickle cell (Are the current guidelines based on solid evidence?), OCT in trauma, intravitreal antibiotics with posterior segment foreign bodies, when to give up on NLP eyes, what steps are truly needed and proven to reduce the risk of sympathetic ophthalmia, etc.) we are also interested in orbital fractures (Will strabismus usually get better without orbital surgery, or should fractures be repaired promptly?), chemical eye injury, traumatic optic neuropathy, and other eye trauma subjects.December 16, 2011. W. Daniel Stamer will be taking on the role of J Ocular Pharmacology and Therapeutics in Jan 2012. April 11, 2012. The Journal of Ophthalmic and Vision Research is now in Medline and in Pubmedcentral.Eye (London) is now in Pubmedcentral.Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology added to table.ISRN Ophthalmology and Case Reports in Ophthalmological Medicine are now charging for publication. September 1, 2012. International Journal of Ophthalmology is a journal from China, published in both Chinese and English, which is in Medline and Pubmedcentral. Also added the Internet Journal of Ophthalmology and Visual Science, which charges $225–less than most journals. April 5, 2013: Digital Journal of Ophthalmology now in pubmedcentral. Does not have publication charges. August 2, 2014: Numerous additions were made. Note Saudi Journal of Ophthalmology is now in pubmedcentral! Amazingly, the Middle Eastern and South Asian countries have a huge number of journals in pubmedcentral and Medline, and are free to submit to. These are the Middle East African Journal of Ophthalmology, Indian Journal of Ophthalmology, Saudi Journal of Ophthalmology, Oman Journal of Ophthalmology, and the Journal of Ophthalmic and Vision Research (Iran). So these countries are proving that this model can work. The American and European ophthalmologic societies and countries need to catch up with what they are doing in the Middle East. I encourage ophthalmologists to provide good peer-review for these open access journals. [The above table may have mistakes. If you spot any mistakes,put a comment below or email me. Christopher Leffler.]
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