Predatory journal
A predatory journal collects article charges without delivering genuine peer review, editorial oversight or archiving. The defining feature is the gap between what is promised and what is performed, not the existence of a fee.
Reviewed 1 August 2026
In practice
Why fees alone prove nothing
Charging an APC is normal practice at reputable publishers. The signal is not the charge but the absence of what it supposedly pays for: no named editorial board with verifiable affiliations, no stated review process, no archiving arrangement, DOIs that do not resolve.
Checks that take minutes
Verify indexing at the source rather than trusting a badge on the site. Open three articles and check that the DOIs resolve to the correct papers. Look for a written description of how review is conducted, not just the phrase 'peer reviewed'.
Common misconceptions
There is no single authoritative list of predatory journals, and treating any one list as definitive is unwise.
A journal being new, small, or based outside Europe and North America is not evidence of anything.