Written and maintained by CASRAI Editorial Board
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JSTOR Daily is an online magazine published by JSTOR that explains news, culture and history for a general reader and points each story back to research on JSTOR. It is edited and fact-checked, but it is not peer reviewed, which decides how a researcher should use and cite it. Information below was checked against the publication’s own pages on 2026-10-29.
What JSTOR Daily is
JSTOR Daily is a magazine that places current and historical news in context using scholarly research. Its About page says it is “published by JSTOR, the nonprofit digital library of scholarly journals.” Stories are written by experts for a general audience, so they read like magazine features rather than journal articles.
Its stories are sorted into five categories: Arts & Culture, Education & Society, Politics & History, Science & Technology, and Business & Economics.
Who runs it and who pays for it
The About page states that JSTOR Daily “is primarily funded by ITHAKA, the nonprofit parent organization of JSTOR.” The magazine is free to read. The page does not give a launch date or a size figure for the archive, so none is stated here.
Editorial control is described in the same place: stories “are edited by professional editors and fact-checked by a professional fact-checker or an editor.” The page is equally direct about what that process is not. The stories “are not peer reviewed in the way academic papers or books might be.”
How to use JSTOR Daily for research
The About page describes one mechanism that sets the magazine apart from most popular science and humanities writing: “Every JSTOR Daily story contains links to free, publicly accessible research on JSTOR.” Working from that description, a practical routine is:
- Open a story and read it as an orientation to the topic, not as evidence.
- Look for the small “J” icon in the text. The About page says free JSTOR resources are marked with it.
- Scroll to the “Resources” section at the bottom of the story, where the same free links are repeated.
- Open the linked JSTOR items and read them directly; these are the scholarly sources behind the claim.
- Record the underlying article or book in your notes, with the details taken from its own JSTOR page, instead of recording the magazine story as your source.
- To follow new stories, use the weekly email: the About page says a selection of the best stories arrives “each Thursday.”
The magazine is free to read. The About page mentions free JSTOR account registration and JPASS, “our paid service for researchers who don’t have access by other means,” in connection with reading and downloading the research itself. What a free account or JPASS includes is set on JSTOR’s own pages and can change, so check those before relying on a specific allowance. For how JSTOR’s journal collections are organised, see JSTOR Journals: what they are and how to find the list.
Strengths and limits
Strengths
- Every story is tied to scholarship on JSTOR through the “J” icon links and the Resources section, so a reader can move from a plain-language account to the research behind it.
- Stories go through a stated editing and fact-checking process.
- The magazine is free to read.
Limits
- It is not peer reviewed. The publication says so itself, so it should not be cited as if it were a journal article in a literature review.
- Stories are written for a general audience, and the publication’s submission guidelines exclude specialist-only writing, so technical detail is deliberately reduced.
Where it fits in a source hierarchy
The About page’s own wording supports a simple rule: use JSTOR Daily to find and understand a topic, then cite the peer-reviewed article or book it links to for scholarly claims. If you need the magazine itself, for example to discuss public communication of research, cite the story as a magazine article. For the difference between editorial review and peer review, and for ways to confirm a source is peer reviewed, see how to find peer-reviewed journals.
Who can write for it
The submission guidelines at daily.jstor.org/submit say the editors accept pitches based on JSTOR’s library, open JSTOR collections, Reveal Digital, reading lists, annotations, pedagogical essays, and essays on Path to Open titles. They do not accept previously published content, specialist-only writing, hard-to-read work, spec stories or email attachments. Pitches go through the “Contact the Editors” form, feature pitches run about 2,000 words, and the guidelines say all contributors are compensated for published work (no rates are listed). Feature pitches are currently paused; the guidelines ask writers to check back in January 2027 (checked 2026-10-29).
Alternatives
These are other free, expert-written magazines. Each row states only what the publication says about itself.
| Publication | What it says about itself | Free to read |
|---|---|---|
| JSTOR Daily | Published by JSTOR; edited and fact-checked; each story links to free JSTOR research; not peer reviewed | Yes |
| The Conversation | Nonprofit, independent news organisation; articles “written by academic experts for the general public” and “edited by our team of journalists”; articles distributed under a Creative Commons license | Yes |
| Aeon | Run by a not-for-profit registered charity; “written by a human being who has expertise in their field”; covers philosophy, science, psychology, society and culture | Yes (“completely free to enjoy”) |
| Project MUSE | A scholarly platform for journals and books, covered in a separate CASRAI guide; it is a research database, not a magazine | See the guide |
FAQ
Is JSTOR Daily free?
Yes. The About page says the magazine is free to read, and that every story links to free, publicly accessible research on JSTOR.
Is JSTOR Daily peer reviewed?
No. The About page says stories are edited and fact-checked but “not peer reviewed in the way academic papers or books might be.”
Can I cite JSTOR Daily?
You can cite a story as a magazine article when the story itself is your subject. For scholarly claims, cite the peer-reviewed research the story links to, and check your instructor’s or journal’s rules on citing popular sources.
What is the “J” icon?
It marks the free JSTOR resources linked from a story. The same links are repeated in the “Resources” section at the bottom of each story.
Can I submit a story?
Pitches are accepted through the “Contact the Editors” form under the rules above. Feature pitches were paused as of 2026-10-29, with the guidelines asking writers to check back in January 2027.
Who owns JSTOR Daily?
It is published by JSTOR and primarily funded by ITHAKA, the nonprofit parent of JSTOR.
Sources
- JSTOR Daily, About: daily.jstor.org/about (checked 2026-10-29)
- JSTOR Daily, Submission Guidelines: daily.jstor.org/submit (checked 2026-10-29)
- The Conversation, Who we are: theconversation.com/us/who-we-are (checked 2026-10-29)
- Aeon, About: aeon.co/about (checked 2026-10-29)
