Article level metrics

Article level metrics (ALMs) aim to quantify the usage (downloads, views), impact (citations), saves (bookmarks), and discussion (social media) of scholarly work at the article level. ALMs comprise a set of easy-to-understand real-time impact indicators that track how an article is read, discussed, or cited. The usage is calculated from individual accesses to the Copernicus library servers (robot traffic is filtered), the impact is calculated from CrossRef and Google Scholar citations, the saves are counted from Mendeley, and the discussions are represented by Research Blogging, Facebook, ScienceSeeker, Nature Blogs, Wikipedia, Wordpress.com, Reddit, and Google Blogs.

In comparison to the traditional way of measuring impact at the journal level, ALMs offer a more informative way of assessing the overall influence and reach of the articles themselves.

Article level metrics are available for all articles of journals published by Copernicus Publications and all preprints posted on Copernicus' preprint platforms. Authors can stay up to date with their papers and share the information about the impact of their published work with peers, funding institutions, research bodies, and the overall scientific community.

Thus, ALMs have value for authors, readers, libraries, institutions, and funders:

• Authors can track their research, discover new research in their field, and find influential collaborators.
• Readers have the tools to browse and navigate the journal site.
• Libraries have the information they need to serve authors and readers.
• Institutions have effective tools to evaluate researchers with regard to hiring, tenure appointment, and promotion.
• Funders can use ALMs to gain a comprehensive overview of a researcher's influence.

For more detailed information about ALMs, please see PLOS and SPARC.

Please check the metrics tab on the HTML page of the article or preprint you are interested in.