Best Cardiology and Cardiovascular Medicine Journals (2026)
Paste your title and abstract to get 5 realistic matches from verified biomedical journals — every publisher, no predatory journals, and your abstract is never stored.
Type your field and pick it to see the top-ranked journals — every journal listed is indexed in PubMed, DOAJ, or a curated core source list.
Top Cardiology and Cardiovascular Medicine journals
| # | Journal | h-index | Citations/paper (2 yr) | Tier | Access | Indexed in |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nature Reviews Cardiology Nature Portfolio | 248 | 16.67 | Flagship | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 2 | Annual Review of Medicine Annual Reviews | 227 | 10.25 | Flagship | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 3 | Basic Research in Cardiology Springer Nature | 136 | 8.8 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 4 | JAMA Cardiology American Medical Association | 169 | 7.86 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 5 | Current Hypertension Reports Springer Science+Business Media | 119 | 6.29 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 6 | Progress in Cardiovascular Diseases Elsevier BV | 183 | 6.1 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 7 | Circulation Arrhythmia and Electrophysiology Lippincott Williams & Wilkins | 161 | 5.86 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 8 | Circulation Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes Lippincott Williams & Wilkins | 138 | 5.63 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 9 | Journal of the American Heart Association Wiley | 199 | 5.39 | Leading field journal | Open access · APC $3,700 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 10 | BioMedical Engineering OnLine BioMed Central | 123 | 5.39 | Leading field journal | Open access · APC $2,690 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 11 | Circulation Research Lippincott Williams & Wilkins | 506 | 5.38 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 12 | JACC. Cardiovascular imaging Elsevier BV | 203 | 5.37 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 13 | Clinical Science Portland Press | 213 | 4.78 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 14 | Heart Failure Reviews Springer Science+Business Media | 122 | 4.72 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 15 | Cardiovascular Research Oxford University Press | 299 | 4.71 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 16 | Annals of Internal Medicine American College of Physicians | 652 | 4.66 | Flagship | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 17 | Circulation Heart Failure Lippincott Williams & Wilkins | 171 | 4.59 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 18 | EuroIntervention European Association of Percutaneous Cardiovascular Interventions | 120 | 4.5 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 19 | Circulation Cardiovascular Interventions Lippincott Williams & Wilkins | 140 | 4.43 | Leading field journal | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 20 | Journal of Internal Medicine Wiley | 238 | 4.42 | Solid specialist | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 21 | European Journal of Clinical Investigation Wiley | 166 | 4.39 | Solid specialist | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 22 | Journal of the American Society of Echocardiography Elsevier BV | 187 | 4.22 | Solid specialist | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 23 | JACC Heart Failure Elsevier BV | 142 | 4.2 | Solid specialist | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 24 | Journal of Molecular and Cellular Cardiology Elsevier BV | 219 | 4.14 | Solid specialist | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 25 | Circulation Cardiovascular Imaging Lippincott Williams & Wilkins | 158 | 3.94 | Solid specialist | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 26 | Frontiers in Physiology Frontiers Media | 232 | 3.76 | Solid specialist | Open access · APC $3,295 | PubMed · DOAJ · Core |
| 27 | Hypertension Research Springer Nature | 126 | 3.67 | Solid specialist | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 28 | Journal of Clinical Medicine Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute | 188 | 3.55 | Solid specialist | Open access · APC $2,895 | PubMed · Core |
| 29 | European Journal of Internal Medicine Elsevier BV | 123 | 3.47 | Solid specialist | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
| 30 | Medical & Biological Engineering & Computing Springer Science+Business Media | 151 | 3.43 | Solid specialist | Subscription | PubMed · Core |
Frequently asked questions
How does the journal finder work?+
You paste your title and abstract; an AI model classifies the paper into biomedical subfields and honestly assesses its scope, then ranks a shortlist of verified journals from our dataset of 2,600+ biomedical journals. Every metric shown comes from the dataset — the AI can never invent a journal or a number.
Is it free?+
Yes — free, no signup, no hidden trial. There's a fair-use limit of 15 matches per day. Browsing ranked journals by field is unlimited.
How is this different from JANE or the Elsevier Journal Finder?+
Publisher tools like Elsevier's, Springer's, or Wiley's finders only recommend their own journals. JANE is cross-publisher but hasn't changed since 2007 and can surface journals of unverified quality from PubMed. This finder is cross-publisher, only shows journals verified in trusted indexes, and calibrates recommendations to your paper's realistic tier.
How do you keep predatory journals out?+
By construction: every journal in our dataset must be indexed in DOAJ, PubMed, or a curated core source list, with a real citation record. Journals with no verified quality signals simply never appear — we don't maintain accusatory blacklists.
Is my abstract stored or used to train AI?+
No. Your abstract is processed to generate recommendations and is not stored, logged, or used for model training. We know unpublished work is sensitive.
Which fields are covered?+
All of biomedicine and the life sciences: 38 subfields from molecular biology, immunology, and oncology to public health, pharmacology, neuroscience, plant science, and veterinary medicine.
Why don't you show impact factors?+
The Journal Impact Factor is proprietary to Clarivate and requires a paid license. We show open, verifiable alternatives instead: h-index and 2-year citations per paper from OpenAlex, plus each journal's percentile within its own field — which is more informative for comparing journals in the same specialty.
Where does the data come from?+
From open, verifiable sources: OpenAlex (CC0) for citation metrics, the U.S. National Library of Medicine's PubMed journal list, and the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ). Publishing in the wrong venue has real consequences — in 2019 a U.S. federal court ordered the publisher OMICS Group to pay $50.1 million for deceptive peer-review claims. When in doubt about any journal, use the Think. Check. Submit. checklist at thinkchecksubmit.org.
How do I find top-quartile journals in my field?+
Use the browse section: pick your subfield and the table ranks journals by 2-year citations per paper. Tier 1–2 journals roughly correspond to the top quartile of a field. Each row shows open-access status, publication fees (APC), and which trusted indexes list the journal.
See the actual papers these journals publish
Waffoo Search runs AI-powered literature discovery across 30+ biomedical databases — free.
Try Waffoo SearchData: OpenAlex (CC0) · U.S. National Library of Medicine · DOAJ. Quality signals are informational, refreshed periodically, and are not an endorsement or judgment about any journal; no endorsement by NLM/NIH is implied. Spotted an error? Contact us and we'll review it.

