Does bioRxiv count as a publication? No — not on its own. A bioRxiv preprint is a citable, DOI-registered scientific manuscript that has not been through peer review, and bioRxiv’s own FAQ states plainly that the server “is not a journal so it has no Impact Factor.” Tenure and promotion (P&T) committees should treat it as a genuine, citable research output — evidence of productivity, priority, and open-science practice — but list and weigh it separately from peer-reviewed publications.
A preprint is a complete scientific manuscript that authors make publicly available before, or independently of, certification by journal peer review.
- What Is a bioRxiv Preprint?
- Does bioRxiv Count as a Formal Publication?
- How Should Research Offices and P&T Committees Weigh Preprints?
- How to Cite and List bioRxiv Preprints
- Preprint FAQs for Promotion Committees
What Is a bioRxiv Preprint?
bioRxiv is a free online archive and distribution service for unpublished preprints in the life sciences, operated by the non-profit openRxiv. Manuscripts are screened for plagiarism and inappropriate content but are posted online within roughly 72 hours, without editorial peer review, copyediting, or typesetting.
Every posted manuscript receives a Crossref-registered DOI, which is what makes it citable and part of the permanent scientific record. bioRxiv preprints are indexed by Google Scholar, Crossref, Europe PMC, Semantic Scholar, and the Preprint Citation Index connected to the Web of Science; preprints reporting NIH-funded research are also indexed in PubMed.
Because it distributes preprints rather than certified, edited articles, bioRxiv does not carry an ISSN — the identifier reserved for ongoing serial (journal) publications. There is no equivalent of a “bioRxiv issue” or “bioRxiv volume”; each preprint stands alone under its own DOI, which is the correct locator to use in citations, CVs, and grant applications.
Does bioRxiv Count as a Formal Publication?
No. bioRxiv’s FAQ is direct on this point: preprints “have not been finalized by authors, might contain errors, and report information that has not yet been accepted or endorsed in any way by the scientific or medical community.” A preprint is a manuscript in circulation, not a certified publication.
This has two immediate, practical consequences for committees:
- No journal metrics apply. bioRxiv has no Impact Factor because it is not a journal — the metric does not exist for it, and any “bioRxiv impact factor” figure circulating online is not authoritative.
- No peer-review certification exists unless a journal or independent review service has posted its reviews alongside the preprint via bioRxiv’s public review dashboard, which some — but not most — preprints carry.
The distinction matters most in biomedical fields, where the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) recommends that journals not treat prior posting on a recognised preprint server as prior publication that would bar later submission — preprints and journal articles are understood as different stages of the same research, not competing outputs.
| Criterion | bioRxiv preprint | Peer-reviewed journal article |
|---|---|---|
| Peer review | None (screening only) | Completed by journal referees |
| Persistent identifier | DOI (Crossref) | DOI (Crossref) |
| ISSN | Not applicable | Carried by the journal |
| Impact Factor | None — not a journal | May apply, per journal |
| Citable and indexed | Yes — Google Scholar, Crossref, Europe PMC | Yes, plus journal-specific indexes |
| Counts as REF output (UK) | Not an eligible output type alone | Yes, as version of record or AAM |
How Should Research Offices and P&T Committees Weigh Preprints?
Institutional guidance is converging on a middle position: preprints are legitimate, citable evidence of research activity, but they are not substitutes for peer-reviewed publication in a promotion dossier. The San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA) recommends that institutions “value the full range of research outputs” and stop leaning on journal-level metrics as a proxy for quality — a principle that supports counting preprints as evidence of output, provided their unreviewed status is disclosed, not concealed.
Funder policy reinforces this. The US National Institutes of Health states that it “encourages investigators to use interim research products, such as preprints, to speed the dissemination and enhance the rigor of their work,” and explicitly permits citing preprints in grant applications and progress reports.
In the UK, the position is narrower for one specific purpose: the Research Excellence Framework (REF) requires submitted outputs to be the version of record or the author’s accepted manuscript of a peer-reviewed work. A bioRxiv preprint is not, by itself, an eligible REF output type — it can evidence timeliness and priority in a narrative CV, but the REF-returnable output remains the eventual peer-reviewed article.
These decisions typically sit with the research administration office coordinating the promotion dossier, working alongside the candidate and department. Research offices advising P&T committees should:
- Confirm whether the department’s or institution’s promotion policy names preprints explicitly, rather than assuming silence means exclusion.
- Ask candidates to separate preprints from peer-reviewed publications on the CV, never blend the two lists.
- Treat preprint citation counts and altmetrics as supplementary evidence of impact, not a replacement for peer-review certification.
- Check REF, funder, and journal eligibility rules before assuming a preprint alone satisfies an output requirement.
How to Cite and List bioRxiv Preprints
bioRxiv’s own citation guidance is the authoritative format: cite the preprint using its DOI, in the style Author AN, Author BT. Year. Title. bioRxiv doi: 10.1101/xxxxxx. If a specific version needs citing, add the version-specific URL alongside the DOI, since revisions post under the same DOI but remain individually accessible in the article’s version history.
On a CV or narrative CV, best practice is to follow the same disclosure standards used for other authorship and contribution records:
- Create a clearly labelled “Preprints” or “Working Papers” heading, separate from “Peer-Reviewed Publications.”
- Include the DOI for every entry, since bioRxiv preprints are permanently archived (via Portico) and citable indefinitely, even if later withdrawn.
- Note the eventual journal placement once available — bioRxiv automatically links a preprint to its published version within about two weeks of journal publication.
- In funding applications, cite preprints exactly as NIH and comparable funders permit: as interim research products, with the DOI as the locator.
bioRxiv preprints cannot be withdrawn from the record once posted; authors may only append a formal withdrawal statement, and the original manuscript stays accessible. This permanence is precisely why the DOI, not the manuscript title alone, is the correct and durable citation anchor for any P&T dossier.
Preprint FAQs for Promotion Committees
Is bioRxiv considered published?
No. bioRxiv preprints are unpublished manuscripts distributed before or independent of journal peer review. They carry a DOI and are part of the citable scientific record, but bioRxiv itself states they have not been “accepted or endorsed” by the scientific community through peer review.
Can you cite a bioRxiv paper?
Yes. Every bioRxiv preprint receives a Crossref DOI, making it citable in manuscripts, CVs, and grant applications. The NIH explicitly permits citing preprints in funding applications as interim research products, and most journals now accept prior preprint posting.
What qualifies as a publication?
A formal publication is a manuscript that has completed editorial peer review and been accepted, edited, and released by a journal or publisher, typically carrying an ISSN (journal) and article DOI. A preprint, lacking peer review, does not meet this threshold on its own.
Is bioRxiv a journal?
No. bioRxiv is a preprint archive and distribution service operated by the non-profit openRxiv, not a journal. It has no editorial board issuing acceptance decisions and, per its own FAQ, “no Impact Factor” because that metric applies only to journals.
For promotion committees, the practical takeaway is definitional discipline: a bioRxiv preprint is real, citable, DOI-anchored research evidence — but it is not a peer-reviewed publication, has no Impact Factor or ISSN, and should be evaluated on its own terms, alongside institutional, funder, and (in the UK) REF-specific rules, rather than folded silently into a publication list.
