Neuron’s Journal Impact Factor (JIF)

Neuron's Journal Impact Factor (JIF) is the Clarivate-computed, journal-level citation ratio the Cell Press neuroscience journal Neuron receives each year in the Journal Citation Reports (JCR) -- citations in the JCR data year to the journal's citable items from the two preceding years, divided by that item count. Neuron (ISSN 0896-6273 print, 1097-4199 online) is Cell Press's flagship neuroscience title, published continuously since 1988, and it is distinct from Cell and other Cell Press journals -- each carries its own separately computed JIF. Third-party JCR-tracking aggregators (journalmetrics.org, bioxbio.com) and Wikipedia's infobox summary of JCR data converge on a 2-year JIF of approximately 15.0 for the 2024 JCR data year (2025 release), with a reported 5-year JIF near 16.6 (single-source, not independently cross-corroborated) and JCR Quartile 1 placement in neuroscience. Treat any single number cited as time-stamped to a specific JCR release -- Clarivate updates JCR every June -- and check jcr.clarivate.com or cell.com/metrics for the current, authoritative figure before citing it in a formal context. Per DORA and CoARA guidance, this journal-level figure should not be used as a proxy for the quality of any individual article published in the journal or the merit of its authors.

ByCASRAI Editorial Board

· Last updated 23 Jul 2026

Worked examples

Is an instance

A researcher comparing Neuron's current JCR entry against Cell's separately computed JIF before deciding which Cell Press title's scope and audience better fits a neuroscience manuscript, checking each journal's own current JCR record rather than an older cached aggregator number.

Is an instance

An author working through the mechanical calculation -- total JCR-data-year citations to Neuron's prior-two-years' citable items, divided by that item count -- to explain to a tenure or grant committee how the reported figure is derived, the same formula Clarivate applies uniformly across JCR-indexed titles.

Looks similar, but isn't

Not an instance

Treating a reported Neuron impact factor number as interchangeable with Cell's JIF because both carry the Cell Press name -- they are separately indexed journals with independently computed figures that differ substantially.

Not an instance

Citing Neuron's CiteScore (a separate Elsevier/Scopus metric with a four-year citation window) as if it were Neuron's Clarivate JIF, or describing one highly cited Neuron paper as "having" the journal's impact factor.

Neuron’s Journal Impact Factor (JIF) is a specific, illustrative instance of the general Journal Impact Factor metric published annually by Clarivate in the Journal Citation Reports (JCR). Neuron is Cell Press’s flagship neuroscience journal, first published in 1988, and its JIF is computed and reported entirely independently of the JIF for Cell and other Cell Press titles, even though all carry the Cell Press name.

What the number actually measures

The JIF is a ratio: citations received in a given year to a journal’s citable items (articles and reviews) published in the two preceding years, divided by the number of those citable items. Neuron (ISSN 0896-6273 print, 1097-4199 online) is indexed in Clarivate’s Science Citation Index Expanded and receives its own JIF on that basis, computed the same mechanical way as every other JCR-indexed title.

A note on the current figure

Third-party JCR-tracking aggregators (including journalmetrics.org and bioxbio.com) and Wikipedia’s infobox summary of JCR data converge on a 2-year JIF of approximately 15.0 for Neuron for the 2024 JCR data year (2025 release), with a reported JCR Quartile 1 placement in neuroscience. A 5-year JIF near 16.6 is also reported by at least one aggregator (journalmetrics.org), but that figure was not independently cross-corroborated against a second source this session, so treat it as REPORTED-tier rather than doubly confirmed. Cell Press’s own metrics page (cell.com/metrics) is the authoritative source for the current, release-dated figure — Clarivate updates JCR every June, so any number cited here should be checked there before use in a formal context such as a CV, grant application, or tenure file.

Worked example

If Neuron published 300 citable items across two preceding years, and those items collectively received 4,500 citations in the JCR data year, the resulting JIF would be 4,500 / 300 = 15.0 — the same arithmetic Clarivate applies to every JCR-indexed journal, from a small society title to a large flagship journal like this one. What differs is the citation and publication volume feeding the ratio, not the formula itself.

Neuron vs. Cell: related journals, separate figures

Neuron and Cell are both published under the Cell Press imprint, but they are editorially distinct journals — Cell covers life sciences broadly across a subscription/hybrid model, while Neuron is a narrower, discipline-specific title covering neuroscience — and each carries its own separately computed JIF that should never be used interchangeably. Cell’s reported JIF runs substantially higher (aggregators report the low-to-mid 40s for recent JCR releases) than Neuron’s reported figure near 15.0, reflecting different citation norms and volumes between a broad flagship title and a discipline-specific one, not a difference in editorial rigor. Always confirm which specific Cell Press title’s JCR entry is being quoted before citing a figure in a CV or grant narrative.

Why this number alone is a poor stand-in for quality

Citation-tracking organizations including DORA, the CoARA coalition, and Clarivate itself caution against over-relying on a single journal-level metric to judge an individual article or researcher. A flagship journal’s JIF is heavily shaped by a small number of highly cited papers and by field-level citation norms, so the same score means different things depending on what is being compared. DORA’s core recommendation is not to eliminate the JIF, but to stop treating it as a proxy for the quality of a specific paper or the merit of an individual researcher’s work — a distinction that matters when Neuron’s JIF gets cited in tenure, promotion, or grant-review contexts as if it described any one article published there, rather than the journal’s two-year citation average as a whole.

Counter-example

Neuron’s CiteScore (a separate Elsevier/Scopus metric using a four-year citation window and a broader document set) is not the same figure as its Clarivate JIF, and reporting one as if it were the other is a common sourcing error. Similarly, an individual highly cited article published in Neuron does not “have” the journal’s JIF — the metric is computed at the journal level, not the article level, which is precisely the conflation DORA’s guidance warns against.

Related terms

Journal Impact Factor (JIF) — the general metric this page illustrates with one journal’s current figure.
Cell’s Journal Impact Factor (JIF) — Cell Press’s broader-scope flagship journal; not interchangeable with Neuron’s own figure.
CiteScore — Elsevier/Scopus’s competing journal-level metric, different window and denominator.
DORA (San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment) — the reform commitment behind the over-reliance caveat above.
How to look up a journal’s Impact Factor — practical guide to finding current, release-dated figures.
Impact Factor vs. h-index — how journal-level and author-level metrics differ.

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