Examples
Worked examples
- Is an instance
A researcher evaluating whether to submit an interdisciplinary data methodology manuscript to the Harvard Data Science Review, consulting its ESCI indexing and Diamond Open Access model alongside its Journal Impact Factor of 4.8.
- Is an instance
A tenure and promotion committee reviewing an applicant's publications in the Harvard Data Science Review, applying DORA and CoARA guidelines to evaluate the individual research contributions rather than relying on journal-level citation metrics.
Editorial commentary
Quick answer: The Harvard Data Science Review (HDSR) is a quarterly, open-access data science journal established in 2019 by the Harvard Data Science Initiative and published by The MIT Press. The Directory of Open Access Journals lists it with no article processing charge. Its Journal Impact Factor (JIF) was 2.5 for 2024 (Journal Citation Reports, Emerging Sources edition); the journal’s own editorial reports 4.8 for 2025 from the 2026 Journal Citation Reports. OpenAlex shows a 2-year mean citedness of about 8.1, a different measure from the JIF.
What is the Harvard Data Science Review?
The Harvard Data Science Review was established in 2019 by the Harvard Data Science Initiative (HDSI). Xiao-Li Meng is its founding and current editor-in-chief, and it is published quarterly by The MIT Press. It covers data science broadly, including machine learning, causal inference, data governance, algorithmic ethics, and data science education. That breadth connects to long-running debates about how the field relates to classical inference, discussed in data science vs statistics. Topics such as reproducibility and FAIR data principles are central to the wider field.
What is the Harvard Data Science Review impact factor?
The Journal Impact Factor is a Clarivate figure: citations in a given year to items published in the previous two years, divided by the number of citable items in those years. For HDSR, the 2024 JIF is 2.5, as cited from the 2024 Journal Citation Reports (Emerging Sources edition). The journal’s own editorial reports a JIF of 4.8 (4.6 without self-citations) for 2025, from the 2026 Journal Citation Reports. Check the current Journal Citation Reports listing before quoting either figure in an application, because the value changes every year.
Where is HDSR indexed, and is it open access?
- Open access: HDSR is listed in the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) with no article processing charge, so neither authors nor readers pay.
- Identifiers: Electronic ISSN 2644-2353 and print ISSN 2688-8513 (Crossref).
- Web of Science: The 2024 impact factor comes from the Emerging Sources edition of Journal Citation Reports, which covers journals in the Emerging Sources Citation Index.
- OpenAlex: About 733 catalogued works, about 10,800 total citations, a 2-year mean citedness of about 8.1 and an h-index of 42. These are OpenAlex calculations and are not comparable with the Clarivate JIF.
How should HDSR’s metrics be interpreted?
Responsible research assessment frameworks such as the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA) and the Coalition for Advancing Research Assessment (CoARA) advise against judging an individual paper by the journal’s metric.
- Mixed content: HDSR publishes research articles alongside commentaries and other article types, so a journal-level average says little about any one piece.
- Article-level merit: A journal metric is not a measure of a study’s rigor. Judge the methods directly, for example by knowing how to choose a statistical test that fits the study design.
- Field differences: Citation rates differ between fields, so comparing HDSR with single-discipline journals without normalization can mislead.
Frequently asked questions
What is the impact factor of Harvard Data Science Review?
The 2024 JIF is 2.5 per the Journal Citation Reports (Emerging Sources edition). The journal’s editorial reports 4.8 for 2025 from the 2026 reports.
Who publishes the Harvard Data Science Review?
The MIT Press publishes it for the Harvard Data Science Initiative, which established it in 2019.
Is the Harvard Data Science Review open access?
Yes. It is listed in DOAJ with no article processing charge.
Is it peer reviewed?
Wikipedia describes it as a quarterly peer-reviewed open-access journal; the journal also publishes non-research article types, so check the article type.
Sources
All sources checked November 7, 2026.
- Harvard Data Science Initiative. Harvard Data Science Review. https://datascience.harvard.edu/harvard-data-science-review
- Wikipedia. Harvard Data Science Review. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvard_Data_Science_Review
- Harvard Data Science Review. Exercising Assessing Impact: From Scholarly Publication to AI Technologies (Issue 8.4, Fall 2026). https://hdsr.mitpress.mit.edu/pub/9v31q2vg/release/1
- Directory of Open Access Journals. Harvard Data Science Review. https://doaj.org/api/search/journals/issn:2644-2353
- Crossref. Journal metadata for ISSN 2644-2353. https://api.crossref.org/journals/2644-2353
- OpenAlex. Harvard Data Science Review source record. https://api.openalex.org/sources?filter=issn:2644-2353
Machine-readable encodings
Use in your systems
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