Countries of the highly-cited Researchers 2025
Which countries have the highest “highly-cited” researchers?
Countries with highly-cited researchers:
The world of academic research is intensely competitive, with a constant drive to push the boundaries of knowledge. A key metric for assessing the influence and impact of individual scholars and, by extension, the strength of a nation's research output, is the number of citations their work receives. This leads to the compilation of various highly cited researchers lists, providing insights into the countries with highly-cited researchers and their contributions to the global scientific community.
Highly cited researchers 2024-2025 by country
According to analyses, including data for the highly cited researchers 2024 by country (which often provides a strong indication for the upcoming highly cited researchers 2025 by country), the United States continues to lead the pack. Despite a gradual decline in its overall share since 2018, the U.S. remains home to the largest number of highly-cited researchers, demonstrating its enduring strength in research and innovation. Following closely, Mainland China has shown remarkable growth, rapidly increasing its share and solidifying its position as a major player in global research. The United Kingdom, Germany, and Australia consistently rank among the top countries with highly-cited researchers, showcasing robust academic ecosystems and significant contributions across various scientific fields. Other nations like Canada, the Netherlands, Hong Kong SAR, France, and Singapore also feature prominently in these global rankings, indicating their growing scientific influence.
H-index by country
These rankings of highly cited researchers by country are typically based on the frequency with which researchers' publications are cited by their peers in scholarly journals indexed by leading databases such as Web of Science and Scopus. These platforms help identify the world's most cited researchers by analyzing millions of research papers over a decade, pinpointing those whose work falls into the top 1% by citations in their respective fields. For individual scholars, checking their highly cited researchers Google Scholar profile can provide a personal h index by country and a snapshot of their citation metrics, reflecting their individual impact.
Beyond individual recognition, these compilations also contribute to highly cited scientific papers country rankings, offering a macro-level view of national research productivity and impact. For instance, statistics from Scimago Journal & Country Rank reveal overall citation counts and average citations per document for various countries, further reinforcing which nations are at the forefront of scientific discovery. The presence of a high number of highly-cited researchers within a country signifies a thriving research environment, often characterized by significant investment in R&D, strong academic institutions, and a collaborative research culture. While a single "most cited researcher" might capture headlines, it is the collective output of a nation's top scientific talent that truly drives its standing in the global research arena. Understanding these trends is crucial for policymakers, funding agencies, and academic institutions worldwide as they strive to foster environments conducive to groundbreaking research and international collaboration.
Highly-cited researchers
We have previously mentioned the citation requirement for the EB1 green card/visa in this post, and you probably know the minimum citations needed for the EB1 visa. But, it could be interesting to know which countries have research papers with the highest citation count? According to the “Clarivate Highly-Cited Researchers 2024”, the top 10 home countries of the highly-cited researchers are:
1- United States
2- Mainland China
3- United Kingdom
4- Germany
5- Australia
6- Canada
7- The Netherlands
8- Hong Kong SAR
9- France
10- Singapore
Figure 1 (below) shows the exact numbers of researchers identified as “highly-cited” in each country. It is worth mentioning that the US, with more than 2500 highly-cited researchers, stays in first place, and China is in second place. The numbers for these two countries compared to the other ones are significantly different, so probably the top countries in the list know how to increase citation score. Clarivate identified 6,636 individual researchers from institutions in 59 countries/regions who fulfill the characteristics of being highly cited in their fields of research. If you are interested in increasing citations or like to pay to increase citations, you can check this post. Finally, if you are interested in boosting your citation to become a highly-cited scientist in your field of research, feel free to browse our offered packages to increase your citation count.
