Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI)

A journal is considered SSCI-indexed when Clarivate's independent, in-house editorial reviewers have evaluated and accepted it into the Social Sciences Citation Index — the social-sciences-scoped citation index within the Web of Science Core Collection — based on Clarivate's quality criteria (peer review, editorial rigor, timeliness, ethical publishing standards) and its own separate impact/citation-influence assessment. SSCI inclusion is evaluated independently of the Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE) and the Arts & Humanities Citation Index (AHCI): a journal is not automatically SSCI-indexed just because it appears in one of those companion indexes, and indexing is not permanent — a journal can later be suspended or delisted if it stops meeting Clarivate's criteria.

ByCASRAI Editorial Board

· Last updated 17 Jul 2026

Worked examples

Is an instance

A sociology journal passes Clarivate's editorial and impact review and is accepted into SSCI; its articles become searchable within Web of Science, and its citation data feeds a Journal Impact Factor computed within SSCI's Sociology subject category.

Is an instance

A university committee evaluating a political-science professor's publication record checks whether the professor's journals are SSCI-indexed — and where they rank within SSCI's relevant subject category — rather than checking SCIE status, since SCIE does not cover social-science journals.

Looks similar, but isn't

Not an instance

A journal indexed only in Scopus, with no separate Clarivate evaluation, is not automatically SSCI-indexed — Scopus (Elsevier) and SSCI (Clarivate) are run by different organizations with independent selection processes.

Not an instance

A general-science journal accepted into the Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE) is not thereby part of SSCI — each Web of Science Core Collection index runs its own separate editorial evaluation, and acceptance into one does not extend to another.

The Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) is Clarivate’s citation index scoped specifically to social-science journals — one of the six citation indexes bundled into the Web of Science Core Collection, and the direct sibling of the Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE), which covers the natural and physical sciences instead. SSCI and SCIE run on the same underlying citation-indexing model — recording each article’s cited references so scholarship can be traced forward and backward through the literature — but each is evaluated, curated, and reported on separately by Clarivate. A journal’s presence in one does not imply anything about its presence in the other.

What SSCI covers today

Per Clarivate’s own current SSCI product page, the Social Sciences Citation Index covers 3,541 actively publishing journals across 58 subject categories, with backfile coverage extending to 1900. Coverage figures move as journals are added, suspended, or delisted, so a researcher who needs a current number should check Clarivate’s Master Journal List (mjl.clarivate.com) directly rather than treat any fixed figure as permanent.

SSCI’s 58 subject categories span the social sciences broadly — fields such as sociology, psychology, economics, political science, education, law, and social-science-adjacent areas of public health and management — each functioning as its own Journal Citation Reports (JCR) ranking category (see “Why the distinction matters” below).

Journal-selection criteria

Inclusion in SSCI is not automatic and is not simply a matter of a journal requesting it. Clarivate applies the same general editorial-evaluation model it uses across the Web of Science Core Collection to SSCI specifically: independent, in-house editorial reviewers assess a candidate journal against publishing-standards criteria (peer review rigor, editorial board quality, publishing timeliness, ethical publishing practices, and safeguards against “predatory” or hijacked titles) and against impact criteria (citation influence within its field), before a title is accepted. Clarivate describes this evaluation as conducted by in-house experts specifically to keep the resulting dataset free of publisher or industry conflicts of interest. Once accepted, a journal is indexed cover-to-cover — full cited-reference, author, and affiliation data, with accurate subject classification — and its status is not permanent: continued inclusion depends on continuing to meet Clarivate’s criteria, and a title can be suspended or delisted later for quality or integrity concerns.

SSCI vs. SCIE vs. AHCI: three separately evaluated indexes

SSCI, SCIE, and the Arts & Humanities Citation Index (AHCI) are the three discipline-scoped indexes inside the Web of Science Core Collection, and each runs its own independent editorial evaluation:

Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE) — natural and physical sciences, roughly 178 subject categories, back to 1900. See CASRAI’s Science Citation Index (SCI/SCIE) entry.
Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) — social sciences, 58 subject categories, back to 1900 (this entry).
Arts & Humanities Citation Index (AHCI) — arts and humanities.

A journal indexed in SCIE is not thereby indexed in SSCI, and vice versa — each index has its own selection committee and its own criteria, even though a small number of interdisciplinary journals (for example, in areas bridging health policy and clinical medicine) can be evaluated for, and accepted into, more than one Core Collection index. For the broader relationship between SSCI/SCIE and the platform they sit inside, see CASRAI’s Web of Science entry, which also covers the Core Collection’s other indexes (Emerging Sources Citation Index, Conference Proceedings Citation Index, Book Citation Index) and Clarivate’s regional indexes.

Scopus, Elsevier’s competing database, has no equivalent to the SCIE/SSCI/AHCI split — it applies a single selection process and subject-classification scheme across all disciplines. A social-science journal’s Scopus status (and its Scopus-derived CiteScore) is therefore a separate question from its SSCI status, decided by a different organization under different criteria. See CASRAI’s Scopus vs Web of Science vs OpenAlex comparison for the fuller picture.

Why the SCIE-vs-SSCI distinction matters for researchers

The distinction is not academic trivia — it changes how journal quality gets assessed in social-science fields specifically:

Journal Citation Reports (JCR) rankings are computed per index category. A social-science journal’s Journal Impact Factor quartile ranking is calculated within its SSCI subject category (e.g., where it ranks among SSCI’s Sociology titles), not within an SCIE science category. A researcher or committee comparing two social-science journals’ standing needs the SSCI-specific ranking, not a general Web of Science search result, to make that comparison meaningfully. See CASRAI’s Journal Impact Factor and Quartile Rankings and How to Look Up a Journal’s Impact Factor guides for how to find and read that ranking.
JIF eligibility history. Through the 2022 JCR release, only SCIE- and SSCI-indexed journals received a Journal Impact Factor at all — a social-science journal that was Web of Science-indexed but not specifically SSCI-accepted (for example, ESCI-only) had no JIF. Clarivate extended JIF eligibility to all Core Collection journals, including ESCI and AHCI titles, starting with the 2023 JCR release. This means SSCI membership is no longer the sole gate to a social-science journal receiving a JIF, but SSCI-indexed journals still carry the longer, continuously-tracked JIF history and the more established subject-category rankings within their field.
Tenure, promotion, and research-assessment use. Departments and funders evaluating social-science output sometimes use SSCI indexing status, or an SSCI-specific quartile ranking, as one input into journal-quality assessment — distinct from checking SCIE status, which is the wrong index for a social-science title in the first place. Research administrators supporting social-science faculty should confirm which index (SSCI, not SCIE) a policy or committee actually intends before applying an indexing requirement.
Discovery and citation tracking. SSCI’s cited-reference data feeds the same Web of Science citation graph used for author-level metrics and Current research information system (CRIS) integration; see CASRAI’s How to Search Web of Science Effectively guide for search mechanics that apply across the whole Core Collection, including SSCI.

As with any single index or journal-level metric, research administrators should avoid treating SSCI membership, or a JCR ranking computed from it, as a complete or sufficient measure of an individual article’s or researcher’s quality. The Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA) and the Leiden Manifesto both caution against using journal-level indicators as a proxy for the quality of specific research outputs. See also CASRAI’s What Does It Mean for a Journal to Be Indexed? guide for the broader context of what indexing status does and doesn’t signal.

Frequently asked questions

Is SSCI the same thing as Web of Science?

No. SSCI is one citation index within Clarivate’s Web of Science Core Collection, alongside the Science Citation Index Expanded, Arts & Humanities Citation Index, Emerging Sources Citation Index, Conference Proceedings Citation Index, and Book Citation Index. “Web of Science” refers to Clarivate’s overall platform, not to SSCI specifically.

What is the difference between SSCI and SCIE?

SCIE covers the natural and physical sciences (roughly 178 subject categories); SSCI covers the social sciences (58 subject categories). Both share the same backfile start date (1900) and the same general Clarivate editorial-evaluation model, but each index is evaluated and maintained separately — a journal accepted into one is not automatically part of the other.

How many journals does SSCI cover?

Per Clarivate’s own SSCI product page, 3,541 actively publishing journals across 58 subject categories, as of this entry’s last verification. This figure changes as journals are added or delisted; check Clarivate’s Master Journal List for a current count.

Does SSCI indexing guarantee a journal is high quality?

It signals the journal passed Clarivate’s editorial and impact evaluation at the time of acceptance — a meaningful filter, given Clarivate’s stated screening against predatory and hijacked titles — but organizations such as DORA and the Leiden Manifesto caution against treating any single index’s membership, or the journal-level metrics it enables, as a substitute for evaluating an individual article or researcher’s actual work.

Can a journal be indexed in both SSCI and SCIE?

It is possible for an interdisciplinary journal to be evaluated for, and accepted into, more than one Core Collection index, but this is decided separately for each index — acceptance into SCIE does not automatically extend to SSCI, or vice versa.

References

Clarivate, “Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI)” product page.
Clarivate, “Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE)” product page.
Clarivate, “Web of Science Core Collection” product page.
Clarivate, 2023 Journal Citation Reports release announcement (JIF eligibility extended to all Core Collection journals).
DORA, San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment.

Use in your systems

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