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Despite High Spending, Japan Trails Global Leaders in Top-Cited Science Papers​

Science Aug 28, 2026

China at Number One​

A report issued in 2026 by Japan’s National Institute of Science and Technology Policy shows that Japan was again ranked thirteenth for its average number of papers in the top 10% most cited globally in the field of natural science between 2022 and 2024, with 3,163 (adjusted to reflect partial credit for joint authorship). For the top 1% most frequently cited papers, Japan ranked twelfth with an annual average of 271. Japan’s average annual number of papers published overall was 66,214, placing it fifth worldwide.

China ranked first for papers in the top 10%, with 84,392 papers, followed by the United States with 29,911 and Britain with 7,696. China was also number one by a wide margin for the overall number of papers and those in the top 1% ranking for citations.

Out of the Top 10 in 2019​

The breakdown by academic field for the top 10% most cited papers shows that Japan has a higher share of papers for physics and clinical medicine than other areas. The United States has higher shares in clinical medicine, basic life sciences, and physics, while China is strong in the fields of materials science, chemistry, and engineering.

The graph below shows the changes in the global ranking for the top 10% most cited papers. Japan was in the top four in the early 2000s, but since then has fallen in the ranking, overtaken by countries like China, France, and South Korea. In 2019, it fell out of the top 10 into twelfth place, and has never returned.



A look at other indicators shows that Japan ranks third globally behind the United States and China for its R&D expenditures and number of researchers, which totaled ¥22.1 trillion and 703,000, respectively. Japan ranks first worldwide in the number of “patent families,” groups of patents for a single invention filed across two or more countries or regions, at 64,000.

Government spending on R&D spiked from ¥2.7 trillion in 2020 to ¥3.7 trillion in 2024. Although R&D expenditures have also been rising in the corporate and university sectors since the early 2020s, this has yet to translate into a higher position in the global ranking for most cited research papers.

Japan had 190,000 female researchers in 2025, making up 19.0% of the overall total. Of these, 39,000 had doctorates.

Despite High Spending, Japan Trails Global Leaders in Top-Cited Science Papers

Japan ranks third in the world for research spending, but remains in thirteenth place for its number of highly cited science research papers.

www.nippon.com