Scimago Institutions Rankings 2024 | Must-know for Students

• Publisher: Scimago Institutions, Spain
• Latest ranking publication date: 06 March, 2024
• Publication frequency: Annual
• Geographic focus: Global
• Ranking type: University rankings.
• Year of first publication: 2009
• 4762 universities in ranking

The SCImago Institution Rankings focus heavily on research and innovation (80% in total, 50% and 30% respectively), looking at the articles published by each institution and the patents they file, etc. but where other rankings which have similar criteria are geared specifically towards the scientific community, SCImago’s ranking has a broader range of institution type. This is obvious just from looking at the list of subjects/fields for which they offer filtered rankings.

The criteria by which they gauge the research quality has several qualifiers particularly in terms of publications. They aren’t just counting the number of articles published, but also where they’re published and by whom, whether the institution itself publishes the articles or if they are found in national/international journals, articles in collaboration with foreign institutions… etc. They also include criteria for the impact of that work. Lastly there is a small percentage of the research score (2%) which is dedicated to the scientific talent pool, i.e. the number of different published authors based at the institution.

The final 20% of the scores calculated using the SCImago methodology are classified as societal, that is, the impact an institution has in the society that supports it, in terms of positive effect on public policy, participation of women in research, generation of knowledge related to the United Nations SDGs...

Types of Data Collected Directly by the Publisher

external databases only

External databases/data providers used

• PATSTAT database
• Google
• Semrush
• Unpaywall database
• PlumX metrics
• Mendeley
• Overton database

Criteria for including/excluding universities

inclusion criterion: all institutions which have published at least 100 articles included in the SCOPUS database during the last year of the given time period

Criteria Classification

Research (50%)

• Normalized Impact 13%
• Excellence with Leadership 8%
• Output 8%
• Scientific Leadership 5%
• Not Own Journals 3%
• Own Journals 3%
• Excellence 2%
• High Quality Publications 2%
• International Collaboration 2%
• Open Access 2%
• Scientific Talent Pool 2%

Innovation (30%)

• Innovative Knowledge 10%
• Patents 10%
• Technological Impact 10%

Societal (20%)

• Altmetrics 3%
• Web Size 3%
• Authority Score 3%
• Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 5%
• Female Scientific Talent Pool 3%
• Impact in public policy - Overton 3%

• Research publications and citations
• Academic reputation - survey or other
• Student Survey
• Internationalization (% of foreign staff/students/exchange)
• Employer reputation survey or Salary data

Methodology

https://www.scimagoir.com/methodology.php

Rating

3.0 / 5.0

Popularity

Google results for: Scimago Institutions Rankings: 254000

PROS

• unlike similar rankings, SIR is not limited to institutions from the scientific community
• large selection of criteria used to reach the final outcome

CONS

• not intended as a student reference
• criteria may not be considered relevant to the quality of all institution type

Practical use

As pointed out earlier, this ranking is not intended as a guide for students looking for a university, so it really isn’t a go-to reference for students, as such. And SCImago make it clear that their intentions lie elsewhere too. I love that they refer to their ranking as “a friendly interface” and it really is easy to navigate and to view different combinations of the criteria and institutions ranked. For students in STEM related fields it can indicate which institutions have successful research programs and, given that you can filter by country, it allows you to see which schools might be best in the country where you’d like to study. All in all, SCImago presents a user-friendly ranking system to consider alongside other similar rankings.

Criticism

I haven’t found any particular criticism of this ranking in the media, but I’ll add in my own two cents here regarding the aim to be all inclusive and how the ranking criteria may (or may not) be relevant to institutions whose focus does not lie among the sciences. A quick glance at the overall results shows clearly that scientific institutions do best with the criteria on hand here. And I’m not sure how a medical school can place thirteenth in Arts and Humanities, so, since their methodology has no specific explanation about how the subject rankings are created, it appears to me that the subject rankings are more a list of institutions where it is possible to study these subjects, as a subset of the overall ranking, and NOT a separate ranking of which institutions do the best job of teaching the chosen subjects.