Water Research

Water Research: The World's Leading Journal on Water Science and Technology

Overview

Water Research is one of the most influential and widely cited scientific journals in the world of environmental engineering and water science. Established in 1967, the journal is published by Elsevier on behalf of the International Water Association (IWA), the global professional network for water practitioners, utilities, researchers, and policymakers. For nearly six decades it has served as the primary archival record for advances in the science and technology of the anthropogenic water cycle — how humans withdraw, use, contaminate, treat, and return water to the environment.

The journal's standing in the field is exceptional. With a Journal Impact Factor reported at 12.8 in the most recent Journal Citation Reports release, a Scopus CiteScore above 21, and an H-index above 400, Water Research consistently ranks first among water-focused journals and in the top tier of all environmental science journals worldwide. It is indexed in the Science Citation Index Expanded, Scopus, MEDLINE/PubMed, Embase, and EI Compendex, and it publishes roughly 20 issues per year, making it one of the highest-volume and highest-impact venues in its discipline.

Water Research is deliberately interdisciplinary with an applied edge. Its stated audience spans biologists, chemical engineers, chemists, civil engineers, environmental engineers, limnologists, and microbiologists, and its editorial policy explicitly warns that work drifting too far into a single supporting discipline — chemistry, toxicology, microbiology, or materials science — without a clear link back to water research may be rejected without review. In practice this means the journal rewards papers that connect fundamental insight to real water problems: treatment, quality, public health, reuse, restoration, and policy.

The journal also has an open access companion, Water Research X, which shares the same aims and scope, the same editorial team, the same submission system, and the same peer-review standards. Authors choose one of the two titles at submission; the choice is blinded to referees, so the editorial process is identical for both.

Aims and Scope

According to the official aims and scope published by Elsevier, Water Research publishes refereed, original research papers on all aspects of the science and technology of the anthropogenic water cycle, water quality, and its management worldwide. Its coverage is intentionally broad, and the scope outline groups the journal's interests into the following themes (paraphrased from the official page):

• Treatment processes for water and wastewater — municipal, agricultural, industrial, and on-site treatment, including resource recovery and residuals management.
• Urban hydrology — sewer systems, stormwater management, and green infrastructure.
• Drinking water treatment and distribution — from source protection to the tap.
• Potable and non-potable water reuse — recycling, reclamation, and fit-for-purpose water.
• Sanitation, public health, and risk assessment — including pathogen control and exposure analysis.
• Anaerobic digestion, solid and hazardous waste management — source characterization and control of leachates and gaseous emissions.
• Contaminants and water quality sensing — chemical and microbial contaminants, anthropogenic particles such as nanoparticles and microplastics, and the monitoring, fate, and assessment of water quality.
• Anthropogenic impacts on natural waters — inland, tidal, coastal, and urban waters, covering surface water and groundwater and point and non-point sources of pollution.
• Environmental restoration — linked to surface water, groundwater, and groundwater remediation.
• Interface processes — interactions between sediments and water, and between water and the atmosphere, with emphasis on human impacts.
• Modelling and data science — mathematical modelling, systems analysis, machine learning, and beneficial use of big data applied to the anthropogenic water cycle.
• Socio-economic, policy, and regulation studies — the human and institutional dimensions of water management.

OpenAlex's analysis of the journal's published corpus confirms this footprint: its largest research topics are wastewater treatment and nitrogen removal, wastewater treatment and reuse, water treatment and disinfection, advanced oxidation water treatment, pharmaceutical and antibiotic environmental impacts, coagulation and flocculation, and membrane separation technologies. Pure case studies with narrow, local applicability are generally not accepted unless they carry wide significance for the industry.

Journal History

Water Research was founded in 1967, in an era when water pollution was entering public consciousness in the industrialized world — just five years before the U.S. Clean Water Act and the first UN environment conference in Stockholm. Its creation gave the emerging field of water-quality science its own dedicated archival journal, and the first volume carried papers that still echo through the literature today.

Through the 1970s and 1980s the journal became the home of foundational work on aquatic pollution chemistry and sedimentology. The 1980 paper on an ecological risk index for aquatic pollution control became one of the most-cited environmental papers ever written, and the journal's 1982 publication on standard methods for the examination of water and wastewater remains its single most-cited item of all time.

The 1990s and 2000s tracked the field's shift toward trace contaminants and engineered treatment: pharmaceuticals and endocrine-disrupting compounds in sewage treatment plants and rivers, the rise of reverse osmosis desalination, photocatalysis, and low-cost sorbents for heavy metals. In the 2010s the journal became a leading forum for reviews on advanced oxidation processes, emerging contaminants, and microplastics in freshwater systems — papers that each gathered thousands of citations and shaped research agendas.

In the modern era the journal has continued to adapt. In 2019 Elsevier and the IWA launched Water Research X as a gold open access companion with identical aims, scope, and editorial leadership, giving authors a fully open access route alongside the flagship hybrid title. Editorial leadership has also renewed: the journal is now led by Editor-in-Chief Professor Ana Deletic, succeeding Eberhard Morgenroth of Eawag, who guided the journal through its peak growth years. With more than 32,000 works recorded in OpenAlex and over 2.3 million citations to its articles, Water Research enters its sixth decade as the undisputed flagship journal of water science.

Editorial Leadership

The journal is led by an international editorial team overseen by the Editor-in-Chief, supported by four executive editors and a board of editors and associate editors drawn from 27 countries. According to the official editorial board page on ScienceDirect:

• Editor-in-Chief: Professor Ana Deletic — Queensland University of Technology, Faculty of Science, Brisbane, Australia. A distinguished researcher in urban water systems, stormwater management, and water-sensitive cities, she leads the journal's editorial strategy.
• Executive Editor – Ethics: Professor Mark van Loosdrecht — Delft University of Technology, Netherlands, a pioneer in wastewater biotechnology and nutrient recovery.
• Executive Editor – Manuscript Management: Professor David McCarthy — University of Guelph, Ontario, Canada.
• Executive Editor – Author Feedback: Dr. Maite Pijuan — Catalan Institute for Water Research (ICRA), Girona, Spain.
• Executive Editor – Special Initiatives: Professor Hui Lu — Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China.

The board includes 95 editors and editorial board members across 27 countries/regions, with the largest national representation from China (24), the United States (15), and Australia (10). Subject editors cover treatment engineering, water quality chemistry, microbiology, hydrology, membranes, resource recovery, and data-driven water systems. The previous Editor-in-Chief, Professor Eberhard Morgenroth of the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology (Eawag), led the journal for a period during which its impact factor climbed to the top of the water sciences.

Key Facts

• Journal title: Water Research
• Abbreviation (ISO 4): Water Res.
• CODEN: WATRAG
• Print ISSN: 0043-1354
• Online ISSN: 1879-2448
• Publisher: Elsevier, on behalf of the International Water Association (IWA)
• Founded: 1967 — publishing continuously for nearly six decades
• Editor-in-Chief: Professor Ana Deletic, Queensland University of Technology, Australia
• Publication frequency: 20 issues per year
• Language: English
• Open access model: Hybrid (subscription with optional gold open access) plus the fully gold open access companion journal Water Research X
• Peer review: Single-anonymized; every suitable submission is sent to a minimum of two independent reviewers
• Works published: more than 32,000 works recorded in OpenAlex, with over 2.3 million citations
• Journal homepage: available via Elsevier/ScienceDirect (search "Water Research" on sciencedirect.com)

Metrics (Attributed)

All metrics below are attributed to their sources and refer to specific editions; values change annually and should be verified in the current Journal Citation Reports or Scopus:

• Journal Impact Factor: 12.8 — reported by Clarivate-based trackers for the Journal Citation Reports release of June 2026 (covering citations in 2025 to 2023–2024 content). Earlier editions: approximately 12.4 in the 2024 JCR release (ooir.org), 13.4 in 2021, and 11.236 in 2020 (Wikipedia, citing JCR).
• Scopus CiteScore: approximately 21.6 — third-party Scopus-derived trackers (values vary by CiteScore edition year).
• SCImago Journal Rank (SJR): approximately 3.7 — Scopus-derived.
• H-index: 417 — per SCImago Journal Rank data; OpenAlex independently computes an H-index of 461 for the journal's corpus.
• Quartiles: Q1 in all listed Scopus categories — Civil and Structural Engineering; Ecological Modeling; Environmental Engineering; Pollution; Waste Management and Disposal; and Water Science and Technology.
• Corpus scale (OpenAlex, retrieved October 2026): 32,019 works; 2,335,648 citations; 2-year mean citedness of approximately 13.4.

The journal does not officially publish an acceptance rate. Third-party submission guides estimate roughly 20%, but this figure is unofficial and should not be treated as authoritative.

Indexing and Abstracting

Water Research is abstracted and indexed in the major scientific databases, including:

• Science Citation Index Expanded (Web of Science)
• Scopus
• Index Medicus / MEDLINE / PubMed
• Embase
• Ei Compendex
• Chemical Abstracts Service
• Current Contents – Agriculture, Biology & Environmental Sciences
• BIOSIS Previews and Biological Abstracts
• Analytical Abstracts
• Aquatic Sciences and Fisheries Abstracts
• CAB Abstracts
• EBSCO databases
• Food Science and Technology Abstracts
• GEOBASE
• Metadex
• PASCAL
• ProQuest databases

Open Access and Article Processing Charges

Water Research is a hybrid journal: authors may publish in the subscription model at no charge to themselves, or pay an article processing charge (APC) to make their article immediately gold open access. The journal also maintains a fully gold open access mirror journal, Water Research X, for authors who require or prefer a fully open access venue.

APC: Elsevier's listed APC for Water Research was reported at USD 4,660 (EUR 4,360; GBP 3,730; JPY 577,980) for 2025, based on DOAJ-sourced data aggregated by OpenAlex. Independent submission guides report a figure of around USD 4,840. These are list prices reported by third parties, not an official quotation — the publisher adjusts prices periodically and may offer waivers, discounts, or institutional agreements, so authors should confirm the current fee on the official journal page before submitting.

Embargo and green open access: Elsevier's standard policy permits authors to post their accepted manuscript in their institutional repository after an embargo period (typically 12 months for this journal; confirm the current policy). Preprints may be shared at any time and do not count as prior publication.

Licenses: Gold open access articles are published under Creative Commons licenses (CC BY or CC BY-NC-ND, depending on funder requirements and author choice).

Submission Information

Manuscripts are submitted through Elsevier's online editorial system linked from the journal homepage. The journal publishes four article types, each with explicit limits set in the official Guide for Authors:

• Research Papers — original research with extensive data and in-depth critical evaluation. Total length including references must not exceed 8,000 words. Case studies are not accepted unless they carry wide significance for the industry, and multi-part papers are not considered.
• Review Papers — critical reviews that provide a novel perspective and evaluation; mere summaries of the literature are not suitable. Typically fewer than 12,000 words including references. Cover letters must state the authors' expertise, list their own related publications, and explain how the review adds new insight beyond existing reviews.
• Making Waves — short communications on emerging topics, opinions, visions, and research bottlenecks. Usually limited to 3,000 words with no more than two figures or tables; titles must begin with "Making Waves: " and conclusions should use bullet points. Supplementary information is not permitted.
• Comments (Discussion) — reasoned extensions or criticisms of published papers, sent to the original authors for reply. Comments and replies must each stay under 1,200 words and be submitted within four months of the original article's publication.

Peer review process: The journal uses single-anonymized peer review. Submissions are first screened by editors for scope and quality; suitable manuscripts are sent to at least two independent reviewers. Editorial decisions are taken by the editors, and authors may file one formal appeal per submission under Elsevier's appeal policy.

What improves your chances: The journal explicitly states that it does not conduct pre-submission evaluations — authors should judge scope fit from the published scope and recent issues. Papers with an applied water-research angle are favored; heavily disciplinary studies (e.g., pure chemistry, toxicology, or materials science) that lack a clear water connection are commonly rejected at screening. Manuscripts must follow the Guide for Authors on structure, highlights, graphical abstracts, and data availability, and authors must disclose funding sources and competing interests.

Landmark Papers

The following are among the most-cited papers ever published in Water Research (citation counts and DOIs verified via OpenAlex, retrieved October 2026). They trace the journal's intellectual history from classical pollution science to contemporary challenges such as pharmaceuticals, desalination, and microplastics:

• "Standard Methods for the Examination of Water and Wastewater" (1982) — the journal's most-cited item ever, with over 30,000 citations. DOI: 10.1016/0043-1354(82)90249-4
• "An ecological risk index for aquatic pollution control: a sedimentological approach" (1980) — Håkanson's foundational sediment risk framework, nearly 10,000 citations. DOI: 10.1016/0043-1354(80)90143-8
• "Recent developments in photocatalytic water treatment technology: A review" (2010) — over 5,300 citations. DOI: 10.1016/j.watres.2010.02.039
• "Occurrence of drugs in German sewage treatment plants and rivers" (1998) — pioneering work on pharmaceuticals as water contaminants, over 3,400 citations. DOI: 10.1016/s0043-1354(98)00099-2
• "Reverse osmosis desalination: Water sources, technology, and today's challenges" (2009) — a landmark desalination review, over 3,400 citations. DOI: 10.1016/j.watres.2009.03.010
• "Evaluation of advanced oxidation processes for water and wastewater treatment – A critical review" (2018) — over 3,000 citations. DOI: 10.1016/j.watres.2018.03.042
• "A review of potentially low-cost sorbents for heavy metals" (1999) — over 3,000 citations. DOI: 10.1016/s0043-1354(98)00475-8
• "The kinetics of sorption of divalent metal ions onto sphagnum moss peat" (2000) — over 2,900 citations. DOI: 10.1016/s0043-1354(99)00232-8
• "Mistakes and inconsistencies regarding adsorption of contaminants from aqueous solutions: A critical review" (2017) — over 2,900 citations. DOI: 10.1016/j.watres.2017.04.014
• "Microplastics in freshwater systems: A review of the emerging threats, identification of knowledge gaps and prioritisation of research needs" (2015) — over 2,600 citations. DOI: 10.1016/j.watres.2015.02.012
• "A review on emerging contaminants in wastewaters and the environment: Current knowledge, understudied areas and recommendations for future monitoring" (2014) — over 2,600 citations. DOI: 10.1016/j.watres.2014.08.053

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the ISSN of Water Research?
The print ISSN is 0043-1354 and the online ISSN is 1879-2448 (ISSN-L 0043-1354, CODEN WATRAG).

Who publishes Water Research?
Elsevier, on behalf of the International Water Association (IWA).

What is the impact factor of Water Research?
The Journal Impact Factor is reported at 12.8 in the most recent Journal Citation Reports release (June 2026, covering the 2025 citation year). It has historically ranged between roughly 11 and 13.4 over the past decade. Verify the current value in the live Journal Citation Reports.

Who is the editor-in-chief of Water Research?
Professor Ana Deletic of the Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia, per the journal's official editorial board page. The previous editor-in-chief was Professor Eberhard Morgenroth of Eawag, Switzerland.

When was Water Research founded?
1967. It has published continuously ever since, with roughly 20 issues per year.

Is Water Research open access?
It is a hybrid journal: the subscription model is free for authors, with optional gold open access for an APC. The fully gold open access companion journal Water Research X shares the same scope and editorial team.

What is the APC for Water Research?
The listed gold open access APC was reported at approximately USD 4,660 for 2025 (based on DOAJ-sourced data). This is not an official quotation — confirm the current fee, waivers, and institutional agreements on the official Elsevier journal page.

What is the acceptance rate of Water Research?
The publisher does not officially publish an acceptance rate. Unofficial third-party estimates suggest around 20%, but these should not be relied upon.

How do I submit to Water Research?
Manuscripts are submitted through Elsevier's editorial system, linked from the journal's ScienceDirect homepage. The journal accepts Research Papers, critical Review Papers, Making Waves communications, and Comments; it does not offer pre-submission evaluation.

What is the difference between Water Research and Water Research X?
Both titles share the same aims and scope, the same editorial team and submission system, and identical peer review. The only difference is the publishing model: Water Research is hybrid, while Water Research X is fully gold open access. The author's choice of title is blinded to reviewers.

What topics does Water Research cover?
Treatment processes, drinking water, water reuse, urban hydrology, sanitation and public health, contaminants and microplastics, water quality monitoring and fate, anaerobic digestion and waste, environmental restoration, modelling and machine learning for the water cycle, and water policy and socio-economics.

Is Water Research indexed in Web of Science and Scopus?
Yes. It is indexed in the Science Citation Index Expanded (Web of Science), Scopus, MEDLINE/PubMed, Embase, EI Compendex, and many other major databases.