Journal profile · Mathematics-Applied Mathematics
Observational Studies
ISSN 2767-3324 · University of Pennsylvania Press · United States
Observational Studies: diamond open access (no APC); no APC; review about 20 weeks (community reports); 20 articles in 2025; indexed in Scopus.
Scope
Aims, scope and focus
Observational Studies is published by University of Pennsylvania Press. By OpenAlex counts of its recent articles, its largest topics are Advanced Causal Inference Techniques, Statistical Methods and Bayesian Inference and Statistical Methods in Epidemiology, together about 51.6% of its articles. Its main subfields are Statistics and Probability. (generated from OpenAlex topic counts and CAS ranking data)
Observational Studies is a peer-reviewed journal that publishes manuscripts on all aspects of observational studies, including, but not limited to, study protocols for observational studies, methodologies for observational studies, descriptions of data sets for observational studies, software for observational studies, and analyses of observational studies. Observational Studies is a diamond Open Access journal that does not charge author fees. To support open-access funding for the journal, please contribute to the Lyrasis Open Access Community Investment Program. Congratulations to the winners of the 2024 Cochran Award, Michael Baiocchi and Jordan Rodu, for their article "When black box algorithms are (not) appropriate"
From the journal's Aims & Scope
Research area (LetPub): Mathematics-Applied Mathematics
Editor-in-chief Nandita MitraPublisher website
Main research topics OpenAlex counts of recent articles; shares are approximate
- Advanced Causal Inference TechniquesMathematics31.6%
- Statistical Methods and Bayesian InferenceMathematics10.4%
- Statistical Methods in EpidemiologyMathematics9.7%
- Statistical Methods and InferenceMathematics9.2%
- Statistical Methods in Clinical TrialsMathematics7.8%
- Meta-analysis and systematic reviewsDecision Sciences5.8%
- Philosophy and History of ScienceArts and Humanities5.4%
- Statistical Methods and ApplicationsMathematics3.2%
Rankings & indexing
CAS ranking and database indexing
CAS Journal Ranking
CAS Journal Ranking, upgraded edition (March 2025)Not covered
Not covered by this edition.
CAS Xinrui Journal Ranking (March 2026)Not covered
Not covered by this edition.
CAS Journal Ranking, previous upgraded edition (December 2023)Not covered
Not covered by this edition.
CiteScore quartiles (Scopus, June 2026 release)
| Subject | Quartile | Rank | Percentile |
|---|---|---|---|
| Applied Mathematics | Q3 | 412/680 | 39th |
| Modeling and Simulation | Q3 | 248/397 | 37th |
| Statistics and Probability | Q3 | 192/303 | 36th |
| Numerical Analysis | Q3 | 61/93 | 34th |
| Computer Science Applications | Q3 | 698/1022 | 31st |
Scopus ranks journals by CiteScore within each subject: the 75th percentile and above is Q1, then a quartile every 25 points. A different system from the CAS zones.LetPub
Database indexing
ScopusDOAJLetPub
International journal early-warning lists: not listed in any editionLetPub
Editions, and major and minor categories, are shown separately and never merged into one zone; check which edition your institution uses before you submit or report.
Metrics
Impact metrics and publication volume
Impact
- CiteScore 2026-06
- 1.7LetPub ·
- SJR 2026-06
- 0.34LetPub ·
- SNIP 2026-06
- 0.65LetPub ·
- h-index
- 18OpenAlex ·
- i10-index
- 34OpenAlex ·
- 2-year mean citedness
- 5.31OpenAlex ·
- Share of gold OA articles
- 0%LetPub ·
Articles by year OpenAlex count · 225 in total · the current year is incomplete
| Year | Articles | Open access | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | 21 | 21 | 253 |
| 2025 | 20 | 20 | 377 |
| 2024 | 7 | 7 | 314 |
| 2023 | 34 | 34 | 237 |
| 2022 | 15 | 15 | 200 |
| 2021 | 36 | 36 | 162 |
Sources count differently and were observed at different times, so each source's own value is kept; "publisher" marks figures from the journal's website.
Review & acceptance
Review time and acceptance
Review time from article dates manuscript dates registered with PubMed
Not usableThis publisher's "received" date is mostly when the revised manuscript arrived (46% of articles were "accepted" within 3 days), so it cannot measure review time
Other sources
- Average review time (community reports)
- about 20 weeksLetPub ·
- Submission to publication (journal-reported)
- about 20 weeksDOAJ ·
- Peer review
- Unspecified peer reviewDOAJ
Community reports come from authors' own submissions (confidence 0.5) and are not a promise from the journal; for publisher figures, the journal's own definitions apply.
Fees & open access
APC and open-access policy
Diamond open access (no APC)DOAJ
Every article is open access and authors pay no article processing charge.
| Source | APC | Fee waiver | License | Observed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| DOAJ | No APC | No | CC BY-NC | |
| LetPub | No APC | No | — |
The journal's website is authoritative for fees; sources were observed at different times and each keeps its own value, without averaging.
Submission
Article types and submission policies (journal website)
Policy excerpts from the journal's websiteAuthorship, License & copyright, Open access
- Authorship
No APCs or author fees Model summary
The journal does not require article processing charges or any other author fees.
Source ↗Publisher website ·- License & copyright
CC BY-NC 4.0 license. Model summary
To facilitate the Open Access digital publication of the journal, it will be distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) license or a successor license selected by the Publisher.
Source ↗Publisher website ·- Open access Open Access Statement
This is an open access journal which means that all content is freely available without charge to the user or their institution. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author. This is in accordance with the BOAI definition of …
Source ↗Publisher website ·
Excerpts are quoted from the journal's website; "model summary" lines are written by Workers AI and checked against the text. The journal's website is authoritative.
Profile
Publication details and official links
- Publisher
- University of Pennsylvania Press
- Country or region
- United States
- Language
- English
- ISSN
- 2767-3324
- Official links
- Journal homepage ↗LetPub
- Author guidelines ↗LetPub
- Aims & Scope ↗LetPub
- APC information ↗DOAJ
- Open access statement ↗DOAJ
- License & copyright ↗DOAJ
- Peer review process ↗LetPub
- Editorial board ↗LetPub
FAQ
Frequently asked questions about Observational Studies
How long does peer review take at Observational Studies?
Authors report an average review time of about 20 weeks. Article statistics cover accepted papers only, publisher figures follow the journal's own definitions, and community reports come from authors' own submissions; none is a promise from the journal.
Which databases index Observational Studies?
According to LetPub and DOAJ records, Observational Studies is indexed in Scopus and DOAJ.
Is Observational Studies open access, and what is the APC?
Observational Studies is a diamond open-access journal (no APC). It charges no article processing charge.
Sources and updates
The facts on this page come from LetPub, OpenAlex, DOAJ, Publisher website; every figure is tagged with its source and the date it was observed, and conflicting values are kept per source. LetPub source page: view ↗ (archived 2026-08-25). Last updated: .