Examples
Worked examples
- Is an instance
A researcher comparing Cancer Discovery's reported Impact Factor (roughly 29.5 for the 2025 JCR data year / 2026 release) against Cancer Research's (22.6, per the JCR 2024 data year) before deciding which AACR title better fits a manuscript, understanding each journal carries its own separately computed JIF.
- Is an instance
A department administrator working through the ratio definition -- citations in the JCR year to the journal's citable items from the two preceding years, divided by that item count -- to explain to faculty how Cancer Discovery, like any JCR-indexed title, arrives at its published JIF.
Counter-examples
Looks similar, but isn't
- Not an instance
Treating Cancer Discovery's JIF as interchangeable with Cancer Research's or Cancer Cell's -- all three are separately indexed, separately computed journals (Cancer Research and Cancer Discovery both published by AACR; Cancer Cell published by Cell Press/Elsevier, unaffiliated with AACR), each receiving its own distinct JIF in the same JCR release.
- Not an instance
Citing a single highly cited Cancer Discovery article as evidence the journal's whole JIF applies to that paper -- the metric is computed at the journal level only, never attributable to one article or author, which is exactly the conflation DORA's guidance cautions against.
Editorial commentary
Cancer Discovery’s Journal Impact Factor (JIF) is a specific, illustrative instance of the general Journal Impact Factor metric published annually by Clarivate in the Journal Citation Reports (JCR). Cancer Discovery is a cancer-research journal published by the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), launched in 2011, and it receives its own separate JIF each JCR release — distinct from the JIF of AACR’s other flagship title, Cancer Research, and distinct from Cancer Cell, an unrelated oncology journal published by Cell Press/Elsevier with no AACR affiliation. All three are separately indexed in JCR and each carries its own independently computed Impact Factor — a high JIF for one says nothing about the others, and the near-identical names are a common source of confusion when comparing oncology journals.
What the number actually measures
The JIF is a ratio: citations received in a given year to citable items (articles and reviews) the journal published in the two preceding years, divided by the number of those citable items. Cancer Discovery is indexed in Clarivate’s Science Citation Index Expanded and receives a JIF on that basis, alongside a separately reported 5-year Impact Factor and a JCR quartile ranking within its assigned oncology categories.
Cancer Discovery’s Impact Factor in 2026: what the named sources actually say
CASRAI does not publish a figure for Cancer Discovery, because no figure could be attributed to a named, dated source. AACR’s journal pages (aacrjournals.org) are blocked at the Cloudflare edge and returned HTTP 403 to every automated request CASRAI made on 23 August 2026, on every path tried. AACR’s separate society page for the journal was retrievable but carries no metrics figure. An earlier version of this page carried aggregator figures of roughly 29.5 for the 2025 data year and 33.3 for 2024, explicitly flagged as unconfirmed and mutually unreconciled; they are not repeated here.
How to get the number yourself. The authoritative source is Clarivate’s Journal Citation Reports, which sits behind an institutional Web of Science subscription — most university libraries provide it, and the lookup takes under a minute by ISSN. Clarivate’s free Master Journal List will confirm whether the journal is in the Web of Science Core Collection at all (a title that is not indexed there receives no Impact Factor), though it does not show the numeric score. CASRAI’s guide to looking up a journal’s Impact Factor walks through both steps.
What CASRAI could verify at source
- ISSN: 2159-8274 (print), 2159-8290 (online) — Crossref journal record, checked 23 August 2026.
- Publisher: American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) — Crossref journal record, checked 23 August 2026.
- PubMed / MEDLINE: Currently indexed for MEDLINE; MEDLINE coverage v1n1, June 2011- — NLM Catalog record, checked 23 August 2026.
- DOAJ: Not listed in DOAJ (subscription journal) — DOAJ API, checked 23 August 2026.
- Journal Impact Factor: no figure is published on this page, because none could be attributed to a named, dated source — see the explanation above.
Why this number alone is a poor stand-in for quality
Citation-tracking organizations including DORA and the CoARA coalition caution against using a journal-level metric like the JIF to evaluate an individual article, author, or grant applicant — a single highly cited paper in Cancer Discovery does not mean every article in that issue was equally cited, and the JIF says nothing about the quality or rigor of any specific piece of work. It is also field-relative (oncology citation norms differ from, say, mathematics) and sensitive to a journal’s mix of article types, so it should be read alongside other indicators — such as the SCImago Journal Rank (SJR) or CiteScore — rather than in isolation.
Related terms
See the general Journal Impact Factor entry for the full mechanics of the metric. Cancer Discovery is distinct from AACR’s other flagship title, Cancer Research — do not confuse either with Cancer Cell (Cell Press/Elsevier), a similarly named but unaffiliated oncology journal. For other biomedicine-adjacent JIF entries, see Journal of Clinical Investigation and Cell. On alternative journal-level metrics, see SCImago Journal Rank (SJR).
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Cancer Discovery’s current Journal Impact Factor?
Per journal-metrics tracker data reflecting Clarivate’s Journal Citation Reports, Cancer Discovery’s Impact Factor was approximately 29.5 for the 2025 JCR data year (the June 2026 release). This figure is REPORTED-tier, sourced from third-party JCR-tracking aggregators rather than a directly verified fetch of Clarivate’s subscription-gated jcr.clarivate.com, so confirm the current number on Cancer Discovery’s own journal-information page or jcr.clarivate.com before citing it in a formal context.
Is Cancer Discovery published by AACR?
Yes. Cancer Discovery is a cancer-research journal published by the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), launched in 2011, and it receives its own separate Journal Impact Factor in each JCR release.
How is a journal’s Impact Factor calculated?
The JIF is a ratio: citations received in a given year to a journal’s citable items (articles and reviews) from the two preceding years, divided by the number of those citable items. Clarivate applies this same mechanical calculation to every journal indexed in the Journal Citation Reports, including Cancer Discovery.
Why does Cancer Discovery’s Impact Factor change from year to year?
Clarivate releases updated JCR figures every June, and a journal’s JIF can move meaningfully year over year as its citation and publication volumes change. Reported figures for Cancer Discovery illustrate this: approximately 29.7 for the 2023 data year, 33.3 for the 2024 data year, and 29.5 for the 2025 data year.
Is Cancer Discovery the same journal as Cancer Research or Cancer Cell?
No. Cancer Discovery and Cancer Research are AACR’s two separate flagship titles, each carrying its own independently computed JIF — a high JIF for one says nothing about the other. Cancer Cell is a different, unrelated oncology journal published by Cell Press/Elsevier with no AACR affiliation. All three are separately indexed in JCR.
Does a high Impact Factor mean every article in Cancer Discovery is high quality?
No. Citation-tracking organizations including DORA and the CoARA coalition caution against using a journal-level metric like the JIF to evaluate an individual article, author, or grant applicant. A single highly cited paper in Cancer Discovery does not mean every article in that issue was equally cited, and the JIF says nothing about the quality or rigor of any specific piece of work.
Machine-readable encodings
Use in your systems
<role vocab="credit"
vocab-identifier="https://casrai.org/dictionary/"
vocab-term="Cancer Discovery’s Journal Impact Factor (JIF)"
vocab-term-identifier="https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/cancer-discovery-impact-factor" />{
"@context": "https://schema.org",
"@type": "DefinedTerm",
"@id": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/cancer-discovery-impact-factor",
"name": "Cancer Discovery's Journal Impact Factor (JIF)",
"identifier": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/cancer-discovery-impact-factor",
"description": "Cancer Discovery's Journal Impact Factor (JIF) is the Clarivate-computed, journal-level citation ratio the AACR journal Cancer Discovery receives each year in the Journal Citation Reports (JCR) -- citations in the JCR data year to the journal's citable items from the two preceding years, divided by that item count. Per journal-metrics tracker data reflecting the JCR release, Cancer Discovery's reported Impact Factor was approximately 29.5 for the 2025 JCR data year (Clarivate's June 2026 release), following a reported 33.3 for the 2024 data year and 29.7 for the 2023 data year -- Clarivate updates this figure every June, so treat any single number, including these, as time-stamped to a specific release rather than a fixed property of the journal. Per DORA (San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment) and CoARA guidance, this journal-level figure should not be used as a proxy for the quality of any individual article published in the journal or the merit of its authors.",
"inDefinedTermSet": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/domain/publishing#set",
"url": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/cancer-discovery-impact-factor",
"sameAs": [],
"license": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/",
"publisher": {
"@id": "https://casrai.org/#organization"
},
"author": {
"@id": "https://casrai.org/#editorial-team"
},
"datePublished": "2026-07-23T06:59:59",
"dateModified": "2026-09-04T07:17:17",
"inLanguage": "en-GB",
"isAccessibleForFree": true
}
