Suitability of Google Scholar as a source of scientific information and as a source of data for scientific evaluation—Review of the Literature

Comparison of PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science, and Google Scholar: strengths and weaknesses

Falagas, M. E., Pitsouni, E. I., Malietzis, G. A., & Pappas, G. (2008) · The FASEB Journal · doi:10.1096/fj.07-9492lsf · Cited by 5,039 · see citing works

Google Scholar, Scopus and the Web of Science: A Longitudinal and Cross-Disciplinary Comparison

Harzing, A.-W., & Alakangas, S. (2016) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-015-1798-9 · Cited by 1,784 · see citing works

Reducing and meta-analysing estimates from distributed lag non-linear models

Gasparrini, A., & Armstrong, B. (2013) · BMC Medical Research Methodology · doi:10.1186/1471-2288-13-1 · Cited by 1,081 · see citing works

Impact of data sources on citation counts and rankings of LIS faculty: Web of science versus scopus and google scholar

Meho, L. I., & Yang, K. (2007) · Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology · doi:10.1002/asi.20677 · Cited by 974 · see citing works

Comparisons of Citations in Web of Science, Scopus, and Google Scholar for Articles Published in General Medical Journals

Kulkarni, A. V. (2009) · JAMA · doi:10.1001/jama.2009.1307 · Cited by 821 · see citing works

Three options for citation tracking: Google Scholar, Scopus and Web of Science

Bakkalbasi, N., Bauer, K., Glover, J., & Wang, L. (2006) · Biomedical Digital Libraries · doi:10.1186/1742-5581-3-7 · Cited by 752 · see citing works

Comparing alternatives to the web of science for coverage of the social sciences’ literature

Norris, M., & Oppenheim, C. (2007) · Journal of Informetrics · doi:10.1016/j.joi.2006.12.001 · Cited by 733 · see citing works

Which h-index? — A comparison of WoS, Scopus and Google Scholar

Bar‐Ilan, J. (2007) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-008-0216-y · Cited by 720 · see citing works

The Number of Scholarly Documents on the Public Web

Khabsa, M., & Giles, C. L. (2014) · PLoS ONE · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0093949 · Cited by 325 · see citing works

Web of Science, Scopus and Google Scholar: A content comprehensiveness comparison

S. Adriaanse, L., & Rensleigh, C. (2013) · The Electronic Library · doi:10.1108/el-12-2011-0174 · Cited by 284 · see citing works

A Google Scholar h‐index for journals: An alternative metric to measure journal impact in economics and business

Harzing, A.-W. K., & van der Wal, R. (2008) · Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology · doi:10.1002/asi.20953 · Cited by 274 · see citing works

Citations to the “Introduction to informetrics” indexed by WOS, Scopus and Google Scholar

Bar‐Ilan, J. (2010) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-010-0185-9 · Cited by 272 · see citing works

A comparison of bibliometric indicators for computer science scholars and journals on Web of Science and Google Scholar

Franceschet, M. (2009) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-009-0021-2 · Cited by 236 · see citing works

Google Scholar as replacement for systematic literature searches: good relative recall and precision are not enough

Boeker, M., Vach, W., & Motschall, E. (2013) · BMC Medical Research Methodology · doi:10.1186/1471-2288-13-131 · Cited by 225 · see citing works

An Examination of Citation Counts in a New Scholarly Communication Environment

Bauer, K., & Bakkalbasi, N. (2005) · D-Lib Magazine · doi:10.1045/september2005-bauer · Cited by 215 · see citing works

Google Scholar citations and Google Web/URL citations: A multi‐discipline exploratory analysis

Kousha, K., & Thelwall, M. A. (2007) · Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology · doi:10.1002/asi.20584 · Cited by 211 · see citing works

Comparing the coverage, recall, and precision of searches for 120 systematic reviews in Embase, MEDLINE, and Google Scholar: a prospective study

Bramer, W. M., Giustini, D., & Kramer, B. M. R. (2016) · Systematic Reviews · doi:10.1186/s13643-016-0215-7 · Cited by 202 · see citing works

Counting the citations: a comparison of Web of Science and Google Scholar in the field of business and management

Mingers, J., & Lipitakis, E. (2010) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-010-0270-0 · Cited by 198 · see citing works

PubMed, ScienceDirect, Scopus or Google Scholar – Which is the best search engine for an effective literature research in laser medicine?

Tober, M. (2011) · Medical Laser Application · doi:10.1016/j.mla.2011.05.006 · Cited by 192 · see citing works

Google Scholar is not enough to be used alone for systematic reviews

Giustini, D., & Kamel Boulos, M. N. (2013) · Online Journal of Public Health Informatics · doi:10.5210/ojphi.v5i2.4623 · Cited by 187 · see citing works

Automated dose dispensing service for primary healthcare patients: a systematic review

Sinnemäki, J., Sihvo, S., Isojärvi, J., Blom, M., Airaksinen, M., & Mäntylä, A. (2013) · Systematic Reviews · doi:10.1186/2046-4053-2-1 · Cited by 173 · see citing works

Sources of Google Scholar citations outside the Science Citation Index: A comparison between four science disciplines

Kousha, K., & Thelwall, M. A. (2007) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-008-0217-x · Cited by 169 · see citing works

Coverage of Google Scholar, Scopus, and Web of Science: A case study of the h-index in nursing

Groote, S. L. D., & Raszewski, R. (2012) · Nursing Outlook · doi:10.1016/j.outlook.2012.04.007 · Cited by 162 · see citing works

Assessing the citation impact of books: The role of Google Books, Google Scholar, and Scopus

Kousha, K., Thelwall, M. A., & Rezaie, S. (2011) · Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology · doi:10.1002/asi.21608 · Cited by 161 · see citing works

Google Scholar coverage of a multidisciplinary field

Walters, W. H. (2006) · Information Processing & Management · doi:10.1016/j.ipm.2006.08.006 · Cited by 157 · see citing works

The Depth and Breadth of Google Scholar: An Empirical Study

Neuhaus, C., Neuhaus, E., Asher, A., & Wrede, C. (2006) · portal: Libraries and the Academy · doi:10.1353/pla.2006.0026 · Cited by 156 · see citing works

Retrieving Clinical Evidence: A Comparison of PubMed and Google Scholar for Quick Clinical Searches

Shariff, S. Z., Bejaimal, S. A. D., Sontrop, J. M., Iansavichus, A. V., Haynes, R. B., Weir, M. A., & Garg, A. X. (2013) · Journal of Medical Internet Research · doi:10.2196/jmir.2624 · Cited by 148 · see citing works

Methods for estimating the size of Google Scholar

Orduña‐Malea, E., Ayllón, J. M., Martín‐Martín, A., & López‐Cózar, E. D. (2015) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-015-1614-6 · Cited by 147 · see citing works

A new methodology for comparing Google Scholar and Scopus

Moed, H. F., Bar‐Ilan, J., & Halevi, G. (2016) · Journal of Informetrics · doi:10.1016/j.joi.2016.04.017 · Cited by 144 · see citing works

A longitudinal study of Google Scholar coverage between 2012 and 2013

Harzing, A.-W. K. (2013) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-013-0975-y · Cited by 141 · see citing works

A Comparative Citation Analysis of Web of Science, Scopus, and Google Scholar

Levine‐Clark, M., & Gil, E. L. (2008) · Journal of Business & Finance Librarianship · doi:10.1080/08963560802176348 · Cited by 141 · see citing works

The comparative recall of Google Scholar versus PubMed in identical searches for biomedical systematic reviews: a review of searches used in systematic reviews

Bramer, W. M., Giustini, D., Kramer, B. M., & Anderson, P. (2013) · Systematic Reviews · doi:10.1186/2046-4053-2-115 · Cited by 139 · see citing works

Medical literature searches: a comparison of P ub M ed and G oogle S cholar

Nourbakhsh, E., Nugent, R., Wang, H., Çevik, C., & NUGENT, K. M. (2012) · Health Information & Libraries Journal · doi:10.1111/j.1471-1842.2012.00992.x · Cited by 113 · see citing works

Ranking journals: could Google Scholar Metrics be an alternative to Journal Citation Reports and Scimago Journal Rank?

DELGADO‐LÓPEZ‐CÓZAR, E., & CABEZAS‐CLAVIJO, Á. (2013) · Learned Publishing · doi:10.1087/20130206 · Cited by 107 · see citing works

Invisible institutional repositories

Arlitsch, K., & OBrien, P. (2012) · Library Hi Tech · doi:10.1108/07378831211213210 · Cited by 106 · see citing works

RANKING DISCIPLINARY JOURNALS WITH THE GOOGLE SCHOLAR H-INDEX: A NEW TOOL FOR CONSTRUCTING CASES FOR TENURE, PROMOTION, AND OTHER PROFESSIONAL DECISIONS

Hodge, D. R., & Lacasse, J. R. (2011) · Journal of Social Work Education · doi:10.5175/jswe.2011.201000024 · Cited by 105 · see citing works

Accuracy and completeness of publication and citation records in the Web of Science, PsycINFO, and Google Scholar: A case study for the computation of <i>h</i> indices in Psychology

García‐Pérez, M. A. (2010) · Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology · doi:10.1002/asi.21372 · Cited by 101 · see citing works

Counting citations in the field of business and management: why use Google Scholar rather than the Web of Science

Amara, N., & Landry, R. (2012) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-012-0729-2 · Cited by 99 · see citing works

Convergent validity of bibliometric Google Scholar data in the field of chemistry—Citation counts for papers that were accepted by Angewandte Chemie International Edition or rejected but published elsewhere, using Google Scholar, Science Citation Index, Scopus, and Chemical Abstracts

Bornmann, L., Marx, W., Schier, H., Rahm, E., Thor, A., & Daniel, H. (2008) · Journal of Informetrics · doi:10.1016/j.joi.2008.11.001 · Cited by 99 · see citing works

Open access and sources of full-text articles in Google Scholar in different subject fields

Jamali, H. R., & Nabavi, M. (2015) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-015-1642-2 · Cited by 90 · see citing works

Using Google Scholar to Estimate the Impact of Journal Articles in Education

van Aalst, J. (2010) · Educational Researcher · doi:10.3102/0013189x10371120 · Cited by 85 · see citing works

A comparison of 17 author-level bibliometric indicators for researchers in Astronomy, Environmental Science, Philosophy and Public Health in Web of Science and Google Scholar

Wildgaard, L. (2015) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-015-1608-4 · Cited by 81 · see citing works

Comparing Google Scholar and ISI Web of Science for Earth Sciences

Mikki, S. (2009) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-009-0038-6 · Cited by 80 · see citing works

Manipulating Google Scholar Citations and Google Scholar Metrics: simple, easy and temptingPreprint

López‐Cózar, E. D., Robinson‐García, N., & Torres‐Salinas, D. (2012) · arXiv (Cornell University) · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1212.0638 · Cited by 76 · see citing works

Google Scholar’s Coverage of the Engineering Literature: An Empirical Study

Meier, J., & Conkling, T. W. (2008) · The Journal of Academic Librarianship · doi:10.1016/j.acalib.2008.03.002 · Cited by 76 · see citing works

The application of bibliometrics to research evaluation in the humanities and social sciences: An exploratory study using normalized G oogle S cholar data for the publications of a research institute

Bornmann, L., Thor, A., Marx, W., & Schier, H. (2016) · Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology · doi:10.1002/asi.23627 · Cited by 74 · see citing works

Citations and the h index of soil researchers and journals in the Web of Science, Scopus, and Google Scholar

Minasny, B., Hartemink, A. E., McBratney, A. B., & Jang, H. (2013) · PeerJ · doi:10.7717/peerj.183 · Cited by 70 · see citing works

Gaga over Google? Scholar in the Social Sciences

Gardner, S., & Eng, S. (2005) · Library Hi Tech News · doi:10.1108/07419050510633952 · Cited by 62 · see citing works

M icrosoft academic search and G oogle scholar citations: Comparative analysis of author profiles

Ortega, J. L., & Aguillo, I. F. (2014) · Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology · doi:10.1002/asi.23036 · Cited by 56 · see citing works

Identifying evidence for public health guidance: a comparison of citation searching with Web of Science and Google Scholar

Levay, P., Ainsworth, N., Kettle, R., & Morgan, A. (2016) · Research Synthesis Methods · doi:10.1002/jrsm.1158 · Cited by 50 · see citing works

Comparing Web of Science, Scopus and Google Scholar from an Environmental Sciences perspective

Adriaanse, L. S., & Rensleigh, C. (2011) · South African Journal of Libraries and Information Science · doi:10.7553/77-2-58 · Cited by 50 · see citing works

Google Scholar pioneer on search engine’s future

Noorden, R. V. (2014) · Nature · doi:10.1038/nature.2014.16269 · Cited by 50 · see citing works

Journal Rankings in Sociology: Using the H Index with Google Scholar

Jacobs, J. A. (2015) · The American Sociologist · doi:10.1007/s12108-015-9292-7 · Cited by 47 · see citing works

Use of Scopus and Google Scholar to measure social sciences production in four major Spanish universities

Etxebarria, G., & Uranga, M. G. (2009) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-009-0043-9 · Cited by 40 · see citing works

Google Scholar duped and deduped – the aura of “robometrics”

Jacsó, P. (2011) · Online Information Review · doi:10.1108/14684521111113632 · Cited by 40 · see citing works

Does Google Scholar contain all highly cited documents (1950-2013)?Preprint

Martín‐Martín, A., Orduña‐Malea, E., Ayllón, J. M., & López‐Cózar, E. D. (2014) · arXiv (Cornell University) · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1410.8464 · Cited by 39 · see citing works

Google Scholar Author Citation Tracker: is it too little, too late?

Jacsó, P. (2012) · Online Information Review · doi:10.1108/14684521211209581 · Cited by 38 · see citing works

Google Scholar Wins Raves—But Can It Be Trusted?

Bohannon, J. (2014) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.343.6166.14 · Cited by 36 · see citing works

Proceedings of the 21st ACM conference on Hypertext and hypermedia

Chignell, M., & Toms, E. G. (2010) · Cited by 35 · see citing works

Google Scholar as a tool for discovering journal articles in library and information science

Lewandowski, D. (2010) · Online Information Review · doi:10.1108/14684521011036972 · Cited by 35 · see citing works

The dark side of open access in Google and Google Scholar: the case of Latin-American repositories

Orduña‐Malea, E., & López‐Cózar, E. D. (2014) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-014-1369-5 · Cited by 35 · see citing works

The counting house: measuring those who count. Presence of Bibliometrics, Scientometrics, Informetrics, Webometrics and Altmetrics in the Google Scholar Citations, ResearcherID, ResearchGate, Mendeley & TwitterPreprint

Martín‐Martín, A., Orduña‐Malea, E., Ayllón, J. M., & López‐Cózar, E. D. (2016) · arXiv (Cornell University) · doi:10.13140/rg.2.1.4814.4402 · Cited by 34 · see citing works

Where you search is what you get: literature mining – G oogle S cholar versus W eb of S cience using a data set from a literature search in vegetation science

Beckmann, M., & von Wehrden, H. (2012) · Journal of Vegetation Science · doi:10.1111/j.1654-1103.2012.01454.x · Cited by 33 · see citing works

Finding Chemistry Information UsingGoogle Scholar

Levine‐Clark, M., & Kraus, J. R. (2007) · Science & Technology Libraries · doi:10.1300/j122v27n04_02 · Cited by 27 · see citing works

On the robustness of google scholar against spam

Beel, J., & Gipp, B. (2010) · doi:10.1145/1810617.1810683 · Cited by 24 · see citing works

Web of Science, Scopus, and Google Scholar Citation Rates: A Case Study of Medical Physics and Biomedical Engineering: What Gets Cited and What Doesn’t?

Trapp, J. (2016) · Australasian Physical &amp; Engineering Sciences in Medicine · doi:10.1007/s13246-016-0478-2 · Cited by 24 · see citing works

Repositories in Google Scholar Metrics or what is this document type doing in a place as such

López‐Cózar, E. D., & Robinson‐García, N. (2012) · DIGITAL.CSIC (Spanish National Research Council (CSIC)) · Cited by 22 · see citing works

Literature search on risk factors for sarcoma: PubMed and Google Scholar may be complementary sources

Mastrangelo, G., Fadda, E., Rossi, C. R., Zamprogno, E., Buja, A., & Cegolon, L. (2010) · BMC Research Notes · doi:10.1186/1756-0500-3-131 · Cited by 21 · see citing works

The calculation of the single publication h index and related performance measures

Thor, A., & Bornmann, L. (2011) · Online Information Review · doi:10.1108/14684521111128050 · Cited by 21 · see citing works

Studying Journal Coverage in Google Scholar

Mayr, P., & Walter, A. (2008) · Journal of Library Administration · doi:10.1080/01930820802110894 · Cited by 18 · see citing works

Elsevier Compendex and Google Scholar: A Quantitative Comparison of Two Resources for Engineering Research and an Update to Prior Comparisons

Cusker, J. (2013) · The Journal of Academic Librarianship · doi:10.1016/j.acalib.2013.02.001 · Cited by 16 · see citing works

Equality of Google Scholar with Web of Science Citations: Case of Malaysian Engineering Highly Cited Papers

Ebrahim, N. A., Salehi, H., Embi, M. A., Danaee, M., Mohammadjafari, M., Zavvari, A., Shakiba, M., & Shahbazi-Moghadam, M. (2014) · Modern Applied Science · doi:10.5539/mas.v8n5p63 · Cited by 14 · see citing works

Literature searches with Google Scholar: Knowing what you are and are not getting

DeGraff, J. V., DeGraff, N., & Romesburg, H. C. (2013) · GSA Today · doi:10.1130/gsat175gw.1 · Cited by 12 · see citing works

Google Scholar Retrieves Twice as Many Relevant Citations as PubMed and Provides Greater Full-Text Access for Quick, Clinical Nephrology Searches

Wakimoto, D. K. (2014) · Evidence Based Library and Information Practice · doi:10.18438/b8z327 · Cited by 8 · see citing works

Using Google Scholar citations to rank accounting programs: a global perspective

Chan, J. Y., Chan, K. C., Tong, J. Y., & Zhang, F. F. (2014) · Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting · doi:10.1007/s11156-014-0493-x · Cited by 8 · see citing works

Comparison of ISI web of knowledge, SCOPUS, and Google Scholar h-indices of Iranian nuclear medicine scientists

Zarifmahmoudi, L., & Sadeghi, R. (2012) · Iranian Journal of Nuclear Medicine · Cited by 6 · see citing works

Web of Science (WoS) and Scopus: The Titans of Bibliographic Information in Today’s Academic World

Pranckutė, R. (2021) · Publications · doi:10.3390/publications9010012 · Cited by 2,696 · see citing works

Which academic search systems are suitable for systematic reviews or meta‐analyses? Evaluating retrieval qualities of Google Scholar, PubMed, and 26 other resources

Gusenbauer, M., & Haddaway, N. R. (2020) · Research Synthesis Methods · doi:10.1002/jrsm.1378 · Cited by 2,379 · see citing works

Google Scholar, Microsoft Academic, Scopus, Dimensions, Web of Science, and OpenCitations’ COCI: A Multidisciplinary Comparison of Coverage via Citations

Martín-Martín, A., Thelwall, M., Orduna-Malea, E., & Delgado López-Cózar, E. (2021) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-020-03690-4 · Cited by 1,018 · see citing works

Google Scholar to Overshadow Them All? Comparing the Sizes of 12 Academic Search Engines and Bibliographic Databases

Gusenbauer, M. (2019) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-018-2958-5 · Cited by 687 · see citing works

Dimensions: A competitor to Scopus and the Web of Science?

Thelwall, M. (2018) · Journal of Informetrics · doi:10.1016/j.joi.2018.03.006 · Cited by 294 · see citing works

Early Mendeley readers correlate with later citation counts

Thelwall, M. (2018) · Scientometrics · doi:10.1007/s11192-018-2715-9 · Cited by 113 · see citing works

Domain-specific language models pre-trained on construction management systems corpora

Zhong, Y., & Goodfellow, S. D. (2024) · Automation in Construction · doi:10.1016/j.autcon.2024.105316 · Cited by 65 · see citing works

An Evaluation of Web of Science, Scopus and Google Scholar Citations in Operations Management

Chapman, K., & Ellinger, A. E. (2019) · The International Journal of Logistics Management · doi:10.1108/ijlm-04-2019-0110 · Cited by 55 · see citing works

Tale of Three Databases: The Implication of Coverage Demonstrated for a Sample Query

Bar-Ilan, J. (2018) · Frontiers in Research Metrics and Analytics · doi:10.3389/frma.2018.00006 · Cited by 43 · see citing works

Poor visibility of retracted articles: a problem that should no longer be ignored

Boudry, C., Howard, K., & Mouriaux, F. (2023) · BMJ · doi:10.1136/bmj-2022-072929 · Cited by 22 · see citing works

Can Microsoft Academic Help to Assess the Citation Impact of Academic Books?

Kousha, K., & Thelwall, M. (2018) · Journal of Informetrics · doi:10.1016/j.joi.2018.08.003 · Cited by 22 · see citing works

Economic optimization analysis of different electric powertrain technologies for vans applied to last mile delivery fleets

Castillo Campo, O., & Álvarez Fernández, R. (2023) · Journal of Cleaner Production · doi:10.1016/j.jclepro.2022.135677 · Cited by 15 · see citing works

Research trend on the application of “E-learning adoption theory” : A scientometric study during 2000-2019, based on Web of Science and SCOPUS

Mashroofa, M. M., Jusoh, M., & Chinna, K. (2019) · Collnet Journal of Scientometrics and Information Management · doi:10.1080/09737766.2020.1729072 · Cited by 18 · see citing works

A Comparison of Web of Science and Scopus for Iranian Publications and Citation Impact

Erfanmanesh, M., & Didegah, F. (2013) · DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) · Cited by 12 · see citing works

Bibliometric factors associated with h-index of Peruvian researchers with publications indexed on Web of Science and Scopus databases

Vílchez‐Román, C. (2014) · Transinformação · doi:10.1590/0103-37862014000200004 · Cited by 16 · see citing works

Comparison between Scopus, Web of Science, Pubmed and Publishers for Mislabelled Review Papers

Yeung, A. W. K. (2019) · Current Science · doi:10.18520/cs/v116/i11/1909-1914 · Cited by 158 · see citing works

A Comprehensive Overview of World Mapping Analysis Research Trends on Impact of Artificial Intelligence in Tourism from 2000 to 2022: A Literature Review and Bibliometric Analysis

Rashid, M. F. A., & Aziz, M. A. A. (2022) · ICRRD Quality Index Research Journal · doi:10.53272/icrrd.v3i3.4 · Cited by 8 · see citing works