What journal acceptance rates really mean

Rejection hurts...especially in the research world, where you pour all the hardwork and energy into your paper. When we view the acceptance rate of a journal we automatically assume it indicates the chances of getting accepted... or does it? 

This webinar takes a close look at what journal acceptance rates (the rate at which journals accept submitted manuscripts) signify, and how closely correlated they are to other journal attributes. In doing so, we aim to help provide context to the indicator, and useful guidance on to what extent submitting authors should consider this when selecting a journal for their manuscript. 

The key learnings of this webinar include:

• Journal acceptance rates are not strongly correlated with many other attributes of a journal 

• Where they are correlations, for example, between journal age and the acceptance rates, the range of acceptance rates is still so broad that it has no real-world meaning 

• Perhaps most importantly, there is no signal that high impact or quality journals tend to have low acceptance rates 

• As such, we recommend that the journal acceptance rate be considered alongside other indicators and qualities of the journal and be taken as no more and no less than its calculation and meaning