Best Pulmonary and Respiratory 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 Pulmonary and Respiratory Medicine journals

#Journalh-indexCitations/paper (2 yr)TierAccessIndexed in
1The Lancet Respiratory Medicine
Elsevier BV
25610.62FlagshipSubscriptionPubMed · Core
2European Respiratory Review
European Respiratory Society
1359.82Leading field journalOpen access · APC —PubMed · DOAJ · Core
3European Respiratory Journal
European Respiratory Society
3588.49Leading field journalSubscriptionPubMed · Core
4Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews
Elsevier BV
4607.05Leading field journalSubscriptionPubMed · Core
5Gastric Cancer
Springer Science+Business Media
1275.65Leading field journalSubscriptionPubMed · Core
6Annals of Translational Medicine
AME Publishing Company
1195.59Leading field journalOpen access · APC —PubMed · Core
7Prostate Cancer and Prostatic Diseases
Springer Nature
1005.38Leading field journalSubscriptionPubMed · Core
8Respiratory Research
BioMed Central
1595.35Leading field journalOpen access · APC $3,190PubMed · DOAJ · Core
9Nature Reviews Urology
Nature Portfolio
1395.34Leading field journalSubscriptionPubMed · Core
10Seminars in Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine
Thieme Medical Publishers (Germany)
1014.61Leading field journalSubscriptionPubMed · Core
11Seminars in Radiation Oncology
Elsevier BV
1224.46Leading field journalSubscriptionPubMed · Core
12Journal of Photochemistry and Photobiology B Biology
Elsevier BV
1853.67Leading field journalSubscriptionPubMed · Core
13Thorax
BMJ
3213.61Leading field journalSubscriptionPubMed · Core
14American Journal of Physiology-Lung Cellular and Molecular Physiology
American Physical Society
2093.46Leading field journalSubscriptionPubMed · Core
15International Journal of COPD
Dove Medical Press
1123.31Leading field journalOpen access · APC $2,836PubMed · DOAJ · Core
16Biomechanics and Modeling in Mechanobiology
Springer Science+Business Media
1073.28Leading field journalSubscriptionPubMed · Core
17Radiation Oncology
BioMed Central
1163.17Solid specialistOpen access · APC $2,990PubMed · DOAJ · Core
18Journal of Applied Physiology
American Physiological Society
4033.08Leading field journalSubscriptionPubMed · Core
19World Journal of Urology
Springer Science+Business Media
1292.98Solid specialistSubscriptionPubMed · Core
20Current Opinion in Pulmonary Medicine
Lippincott Williams & Wilkins
1042.93Solid specialistSubscriptionPubMed · Core
21American Journal of Respiratory Cell and Molecular Biology
American Thoracic Society
2132.85Solid specialistSubscriptionPubMed · Core
22BMC Pulmonary Medicine
BioMed Central
1072.83Solid specialistOpen access · APC $2,790PubMed · DOAJ · Core
23Neonatology
Karger Publishers
1162.82Solid specialistSubscriptionPubMed · Core
24European Journal of Cardio-Thoracic Surgery
Oxford University Press
1852.81Solid specialistSubscriptionPubMed · Core
25Journal of Korean Medical Science
Korean Academy of Medical Sciences
1122.78Solid specialistOpen access · APC $690PubMed · DOAJ · Core
26Journal of Endourology
Mary Ann Liebert, Inc.
1272.56Solid specialistSubscriptionPubMed · Core
27Yonsei Medical Journal
Yonsei University College of Medicine
972.5Solid specialistOpen access · APC $700PubMed · DOAJ · Core
28Respirology
Wiley
1372.47Solid specialistSubscriptionPubMed · Core
29World Journal of Surgical Oncology
BioMed Central
1002.47Solid specialistOpen access · APC $2,890PubMed · DOAJ · Core
30Acta Oncologica
Taylor & Francis
1502.46Solid specialistOpen access · APC —PubMed · DOAJ · 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.

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Data: 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.