Is PNAS a Good Journal? Prestige, Acceptance Rate and an Honest Take

PNAS - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - has been published since 1915. It's one of the most recognized scientific journals on the planet, with a name that communicates credibility across virtually every scientific discipline.

It also had a serious credibility problem for decades. And how that problem got fixed in 2022 is essential context for understanding whether PNAS belongs on your target list today.

The Complicated History: The Contributed Track

For most of PNAS's history, members of the National Academy of Sciences had a special submission pathway called the Contributed track. Under this system, NAS members could submit their own work with reviewers they selected themselves.

This is not normal peer review. Normal peer review involves independent selection of reviewers who have no prior commitment to the authors. The Contributed track allowed essentially self-nominated review.

The consequences were documented and damaging:

• Contributed papers had statistically higher retraction rates than Direct Submission papers in the same journal
• Citation analysis showed Contributed papers were cited less than Direct Submission papers at comparable quality levels
• The track was criticized extensively in the scientific publishing literature as undermining PNAS's quality signal

NAS members defending the track argued it enabled senior scientists to publish important work quickly without getting bogged down in slow peer review. Critics pointed out it created a two-tier journal within the same masthead.

In June 2022, PNAS eliminated the Contributed track entirely. All papers now go through the same external peer review process. No special access for NAS members. Clean break.

This matters because any research you do on PNAS's reputation from before 2022 is partially contaminated by the Contributed track problem. The journal today is different from the journal that existed for the previous century.

The Impact Factor: 9.1 in Context

The PNAS impact factor is 9.1 (2024, Clarivate JCR). Here's how it compares to journals in the same competitive set:

PNAS sits below Science Advances and well below Nature Communications on the IF scale. But it beats or matches many strong specialist journals in most fields, and the NAS brand carries its own weight independent of IF.

The IF of 9.1 has been relatively stable in the 9-12 range, showing less volatility than some multidisciplinary journals during the COVID citation inflation cycle.

What the Lower IF Reflects

PNAS publishes broadly across biology, chemistry, physics, social sciences, and mathematics. This breadth means it draws citations from many fields, but it also means no single high-citation subfield drives the IF up the way a specialized high-output journal can.

The IF of 9.1 genuinely reflects the journal's citation performance. It's not suppressed by any obvious bibliometric issue. It's just that PNAS publishes across many fields and the cross-field citation rate is more diffuse.

The Significance Statement: Required, Not Optional

PNAS requires every submitted paper to include a Significance Statement of no more than 120 words, written in plain language accessible to a broad scientific audience.

This statement appears on the journal website, in PubMed, and prominently in the paper itself. It's not an afterthought.

The Significance Statement requirement serves a real function: it forces authors to articulate why their work matters to people outside their immediate subfield. The best Significance Statements are genuinely useful communication tools. The worst are stiff, jargon-heavy sentences that technically comply without communicating anything.

If you submit to PNAS, spend real time on the Significance Statement. Editors read them carefully. A vague or poorly written statement signals that the authors haven't thought clearly about the paper's broader relevance.

This is a concrete skill: translating technical findings into plain-language significance. It's harder than it sounds and worth practicing.

Acceptance Rate: ~15% Overall

The overall acceptance rate is approximately 15% after the Contributed track elimination. Desk rejection is common.

What gets desk rejected at PNAS:

• Papers without clear cross-disciplinary significance
• Work that is technically excellent but relevant only to specialists in one narrow area
• Studies that don't make the significance argument explicitly

Among papers that reach peer review, acceptance runs around 20-25%. Once an editor sends your paper out, you've passed the significance filter and the question shifts to whether the science holds up to scrutiny.

PNAS uses 2-3 external reviewers per paper. First decisions typically arrive within 14 days (desk decision) or 4-8 weeks (peer review decision). The timeline is faster than Nature Communications and comparable to Science Advances.

The Cost Advantage

This is PNAS's clearest practical advantage over Science Advances and Nature Communications.

Base APC: $1,950 for non-member institutions (US-based NAS institutional members pay less; individual NAS members have additional discounts).

Open access surcharge: If you want your paper to be immediately open access (OA), add another $2,000-$2,500. Total OA cost: approximately $4,000-4,500.

Non-OA option: PNAS still allows subscription-access publication at the lower base cost. This is increasingly uncommon at major research institutions with OA mandates, but it's an option.

Compared to Science Advances ($5,000, OA only) and Nature Communications (€5,390, OA only), PNAS is significantly cheaper even for OA publication. For researchers on limited budgets or without institutional APC coverage, this matters.

PNAS vs. Nature Communications: An Honest Comparison

Researchers choosing between PNAS and Nature Communications face a real trade-off. Here's a direct comparison:

Impact factor: Nature Communications wins clearly (15.7 vs 9.1). In most evaluation contexts, the higher IF is a meaningful advantage.

Brand recognition: Different flavors. Nature Communications' Springer Nature brand is stronger globally, particularly in Europe and Asia. PNAS's NAS brand is stronger in North America and in biomedical fields specifically.

Cost: PNAS wins clearly. $4,000-4,500 for OA vs €5,390 for Nature Communications.

Volume: Nature Communications publishes roughly 9,000 papers per year vs PNAS's ~3,500. Your paper is more likely to get lost in the Nature Communications stream.

Process: Nature Communications gives faster desk rejection decisions (7-10 days) vs PNAS (14 days). Both have comparable total timelines.

The Significance Statement: PNAS requires it; Nature Communications doesn't. Some authors find this a burden; others find it clarifies their thinking.

For most researchers, if the IF gap matters and your institution covers APCs, Nature Communications is the higher-impact choice. If you're paying out-of-pocket or on a grant with limited APC coverage, PNAS gives comparable prestige for significantly less cost.

Who Does Well at PNAS

Reviewing the actual published output post-2022:

• Biomedical researchers with findings that cross the biology-chemistry or biology-physics boundary
• Quantitative social scientists with large-scale studies of broad human behavior
• Earth scientists and climate researchers with findings relevant to policy
• Computational researchers developing methods with broad applicability across biology and chemistry
• Evolutionary biologists with findings that connect to multiple subfields

The common thread: papers that interest scientists in multiple disciplines simultaneously. PNAS is not interested in excellent single-field work; there are field-specific journals for that. The interdisciplinary significance requirement is genuine.

The Post-2022 PNAS: Does the Reputation Recover?

The Contributed track problem is fixed. But reputation damage takes time to repair, especially for journals.

The honest answer: PNAS' reputation is recovering, but it's not fully recovered among all research communities. Some researchers who spent years criticizing the Contributed track are still skeptical. Others have moved on and treat post-2022 PNAS as a cleaned-up journal with a strong IF and a storied history.

For practical purposes: a paper published in PNAS today, in 2025 or 2026, was reviewed by external independent reviewers. The Contributed track issues don't apply to your paper. List it confidently.

Preparing to Submit to PNAS

The PNAS submission guide has full details. Practically:

• Write a genuinely good Significance Statement before you write anything else. It clarifies your framing.
• The cover letter should emphasize interdisciplinary significance, not just scientific rigor.
• Be prepared for desk rejection if the interdisciplinary appeal isn't evident. PNAS desk rejects frequently.

The Bottom Line

PNAS is a good journal. The Contributed track problem is in the past. The current editorial process is clean. The IF of 9.1 is solid, the NAS brand is genuinely recognized, and the cost is substantially lower than comparable journals.

It's not Nature Communications on impact factor. It's not Science on selectivity. But for interdisciplinary research with broad significance, PNAS is a legitimate high-impact target with a cost structure that actually makes sense.

See the full PNAS journal profile for submission specifics and a breakdown of the editorial process.

A practical note on the timeline: PNAS first decisions average 14 days for desk rejections and 4-8 weeks for papers entering peer review. The total submission-to-publication timeline after acceptance is typically 3-4 weeks, faster than most journals at comparable IF levels, which matters if you have a competing group or a conference deadline.

Sources

• Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences: pnas.org
• PNAS editorial policies update (June 2022): pnas.org/about/authors/article-types
• Clarivate Journal Citation Reports 2025
• Pitt RN et al. (2020). Understanding the PNAS Contributed track: challenges and opportunities. PNAS.
• Alberts B et al. (2015). Self-correction in science at work. Science 348(6242): 1420-1422.
• PNAS impact factor history
• PNAS submission guide
• Full PNAS journal profile

See also

• PNAS Impact Factor 2026
• PNAS Submission Guide
• Nature Communications vs PNAS