Is eLife a Good Journal? What the 2023 Model Change Means for Authors

In 2023, eLife did something almost no established scientific journal has done: it eliminated the traditional accept/reject decision entirely.

Under the new model, any paper submitted to eLife that receives peer review gets published - along with the reviewer reports and author responses. There's no editor saying "we're accepting this paper" or "we're rejecting this paper." The peer review happens, becomes public, and the paper is published as an "eLife Reviewed Preprint."

This change is either visionary or chaotic depending on your point of view. Here's what it actually means for your career and whether eLife makes sense as a target.

What eLife Was Before 2023

Before the model change, eLife was one of the most prestigious open-access journals in life sciences. It launched in 2012, funded by HHMI, Wellcome, and the Max Planck Society, with a mandate to reform scientific publishing.

The early eLife model was notable for: requiring consultative peer review (reviewers talked to each other), aiming for a single decision letter (not sequential reviewer reports), and targeting only the top ~10% of submitted papers.

The impact factor peaked around 6.4-7.6 in the late 2010s and early 2020s. More importantly, a published eLife paper was widely understood as a strong, rigorously reviewed result. Hiring committees in cell biology, developmental biology, neuroscience, and evolutionary biology recognized it immediately.

That reputation was built over about a decade. The 2023 model change puts it under strain.

What Changed in 2023

Starting in January 2023, eLife moved to a new model:

1. Authors post a preprint to bioRxiv (or the paper is sent directly to eLife)
2. Reviewers provide peer review - the same quality of review as before
3. All papers that complete peer review are published as "eLife Reviewed Preprints" - no accept/reject gate
4. Editors write an 'eLife assessment' using a vocabulary of terms (landmark, fundamental, important, valuable, useful) to indicate the editorial view of the work's significance
5. Reviewer reports and author responses are public alongside the paper

The key phrase is "all papers that complete peer review are published." This means eLife no longer rejects papers on grounds of significance after peer review. The peer review itself is still real and rigorous. Methods still get scrutinized. Claims still get challenged.

What changed is the final gate: before 2023, editors could decide a paper was reviewed and technically sound but not significant enough for eLife. Now, completing the review means publication.

What the eLife Assessment Labels Mean

The editorial assessment uses a tiered vocabulary:

• Landmark: exceptional significance, likely to be discussed widely
• Fundamental: major advance in the field
• Important: solid contribution of clear value
• Valuable: worthwhile scientific contribution
• Useful: contributes to the literature in a limited way

These labels don't gate publication. They inform readers about the editors' view of the work's significance. In practice, this means the label functions somewhat like a selective accept: a "landmark" eLife Reviewed Preprint signals something different from a "useful" one, even though both are technically "published."

Is It Still Prestigious?

This is the key question, and the honest answer is: it depends on your field and your community.

In computational biology and evolutionary biology: eLife remains very well regarded. These communities were early adopters of preprints and open review. The eLife brand still signals rigorous review and community respect in these fields.

In cell biology and developmental biology: More mixed. Some senior researchers in these fields are skeptical of the model change. Others have adapted and see the public review records as an asset. The prestige is community-dependent.

In clinical and translational research: Less relevant. These fields have their own journal hierarchies and eLife was never a central player.

For hiring committees: This is where the model change creates the most uncertainty. A traditional "published in eLife" on a CV had clear meaning before 2023. An "eLife Reviewed Preprint" published in 2024 is harder for hiring committees to evaluate, especially those unfamiliar with the new model. You may need to explain it.

The eLife leadership's argument is that the peer review record, which is public and citable, provides more information than a binary accept/reject decision ever did. That's intellectually correct. Whether hiring committees will update their evaluation practices fast enough for this to help early-career researchers is a different question.

What 'eLife Reviewed Preprint' Means on a CV

If you're building your publication record and considering eLife, be strategic about how you list it.

An eLife Reviewed Preprint with an "important" or "fundamental" assessment is a genuinely strong result. It means rigorous peer review, public transparency, and editorial recognition of significance.

For committees that know eLife, the assessment label (especially "fundamental" or "landmark") communicates quality effectively. For committees that don't know the new model, you may want to include a brief note in your CV or cover materials explaining that eLife now uses a publish-then-review model where the editorial assessment documents significance.

Don't hide it or be defensive about it. The model is legitimate and increasingly recognized. But clarity helps.

Zero APC: The Financial Advantage

eLife charges nothing to publish. Zero. No APC.

This is funded by its founding institutions (HHMI, Wellcome, Max Planck) and makes eLife one of very few high-quality open-access journals that doesn't charge authors.

For researchers without institutional APC coverage, this is a genuine advantage. Science Advances costs $5,000. Nature Communications costs €5,390. eLife costs nothing. If the journal fits your work and your field recognizes it, the cost savings are real.

eLife Stopped Calculating Its Impact Factor

eLife made a deliberate decision to stop submitting publication data to Clarivate for impact factor calculation, effective 2022. The journal opposes the use of IF as an evaluation metric and decided to exit the system rather than participate in perpetuating it.

The last calculated IF was approximately 6.4 (2021). No current IF exists.

This matters for two reasons:

For researchers whose institutions or funders use IF thresholds: If your evaluation requires a minimum IF (some Chinese institutions, some European grant applications), eLife's lack of an IF is a real problem. You can't get credit for the 6.4 that no longer exists.

For researchers in IF-skeptic environments: The absence of an IF is irrelevant or positive. Many top research groups in the US, UK, and Germany evaluate papers on their actual content, not the journal IF.

Know your institutional context before choosing eLife.

The Controversy Around the Model Change

The 2023 change was controversial within the scientific publishing community. Several senior editors resigned when the new model was announced. Some researchers have been publicly critical.

The criticisms are worth understanding:

• A journal that never rejects may lose its ability to signal quality over time, even with assessment labels
• Early-career researchers face CV uncertainty at exactly the moment they can least afford it
• The model advantages researchers whose communities already understand it and disadvantages those in more conservative fields

The defenses are also worth understanding:

• Publication bias (significance filtering) is a documented harm to science that soundness-only models address
• Public peer review creates more information and accountability than private accept/reject decisions
• The old model wasn't providing what it claimed - many accepted papers turned out to be wrong, and many rejected papers turned out to be important

Both sides have legitimate points. The model is genuinely novel and it will take time to see whether it improves scientific communication or dilutes the journal's signal.

Who eLife Is Best For

eLife in its current form is best for:

• Researchers in computational biology, evolutionary biology, cell biology, or neuroscience where the journal has a strong community presence
• Authors who want rigorous peer review without the binary accept/reject outcome
• Scientists whose funders explicitly support or prefer the eLife model (HHMI-funded researchers, Wellcome grantees)
• Labs that have been strong eLife contributors and want to maintain that association
• Researchers who want the peer review record to be public and citable

eLife is NOT well-suited for:

• Researchers who need an IF for institutional evaluation
• Authors in fields where the journal is not well-known
• Early-career researchers at institutions with traditional evaluation systems that haven't adapted to the new model
• Work where you need clear binary "accepted" status for patent or regulatory purposes

Getting the Most from the eLife Review Process

If you do submit, the submission guide has specifics. A few practical points:

The cover letter still matters. Even though acceptance is no longer binary, editors use cover letters to route papers to appropriate reviewers and to write their assessment. Make the significance clear.

The assessment label ("landmark" vs "valuable") is something you can influence through the quality of your submission. A paper with clear, well-framed significance and excellent presentation is more likely to receive a strong assessment.

If your paper receives a "useful" assessment, decide carefully how to list it on your CV. The peer review is still real, but the editorial assessment is a signal others will read.

eLife's Place in the Long Run

The 2023 model change is a genuine experiment in scientific publishing. Whether it improves the literature or fragments the prestige signal is genuinely unknown: the journal is still finding its footing with the new model three years in. What's clear is that the peer review is still real, the community of researchers who engage with it's serious, and the zero APC is an advantage with no equivalent at comparable journals. Track the conversation in your field and make an informed decision.

For a direct comparison of eLife against PLOS ONE, see eLife vs PLOS ONE.

Sources

• eLife Sciences Publications: elifesciences.org
• eLife 2023 model change announcement: elifesciences.org/inside-elife/54d63486
• Howard Hughes Medical Institute eLife funding: hhmi.org
• Wellcome eLife partnership: wellcome.org
• Clarivate JCR 2021 (last available eLife IF data)
• eLife impact factor history
• eLife submission guide
• Full eLife journal profile

The Bottom Line

eLife is a genuinely good journal for the right fields and the right kind of ambition. The no-rejection-after-peer-review model makes the process more transparent but the peer review is still rigorous. If you're in cell biology, neuroscience, or structural biology and the work is strong, eLife is worth targeting.

See also

• eLife Impact Factor 2026
• eLife Submission Guide
• eLife vs PLOS ONE