to support the quality assessment of academic research.

Publication Forum expert panels decided to downgrade 60 journals to level 0 from the beginning of 2025 

based on the research community's feedback on the quality assessment practices of scientific journals.

The Finnish Publication Forum (JUFO) classifies and rates journals and other scholarly publications to “support the quality assessment of academic research,” according to its website. JUFO considers the level of transparency, the number of experts on a publication’s editorial board, and the standard of peer review to make its assessment, which academics can use to determine the credibility of a given title or its publisher.

JUFO’s classification ranges from 3, for “supreme-level” publications, to 1, which still counts as legitimate publication. Level 0 means the journal is excluded from the ranking, which may dissuade researchers from publishing with them, James Heathers, a scientific sleuth said. Finland’s university funding model relies on JUFO as a publication quality metric.

The 60 journals will be downgraded from level 1 to level 0 at the start of 2025. Of these, 21 are from MDPI, three from Wiley, and three from Frontiers.