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Australia vs Iceland

On research quality in 2022-now, Australia ranks #7 in the world and Iceland #50, of 189 countries. Australia stands higher in 26 of the 26 fields both publish in, Iceland in 0.

Research profiles alike: 0.64similar shapes of research, whatever their size. How it is measured

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Australia

World rank, 2022-now
#7
#8 all time
Works, 2022-now
343k
fractional
Top-10% rate
15.0%
share of its work among the world's most cited
Open access
40%
of its works free to read

Strongest relative focus: Research and Theory, Public Administration, Medical Terminology.

Iceland

World rank, 2022-now
#50
#42 all time
Works, 2022-now
5.2k
fractional
Top-10% rate
10.0%
share of its work among the world's most cited
Open access
46%
of its works free to read

Strongest relative focus: Chemical Health and Safety, Classics, Geophysics.

Who leads, measure by measure?

Australia leads on 6 of 9 measures: research quality, excellence for its fields, output, top-10% rate, citations per work and institutions in the world top 100. Iceland leads on 3 of 9 measures: open access, international co-authorship and growth.

Australia 63 Iceland
  1. #7Research qualityworld rank of 189 countries, 2022-now#50
  2. 1.29×Excellence for its fieldsits top-10% rate against what its topics predict; 1.00× is as expected0.95×
  3. 343kOutputfractional works, 2022-now5.2k
  4. 15.0%Top-10% rateshare of its works among the world's most cited10.0%
  5. 28.5Citations per workall time, per fractional work25.7
  6. 5World top 100institutions it holds among the world's best 1000
  7. 40%Open accessof its works free to read, all time46%
  8. 26%Internationalof its works written with co-authors abroad, all time42%
  9. -3%Growthworks in 2022-25 against 2018-21; half a bar is no change+11%

A rank is drawn as its standing: the longer the bar, the nearer the top. Anything else is drawn against the larger of the two, and two values a hair apart are called level. Quality, excellence and the top-10% rate are explained in the methodology.

Who leads in each field?

Australia stands higher in 26 of 26 fields, Iceland in 0. Australia leads most in Computer Science (#6 against #69). Each bar is that side's standing among all countries ranked in the field: the full bar is first place.

Australia 260 Iceland
  1. #6Agricultural and Biological Sciences-
  2. #9Arts and Humanities#40
  3. #8Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology#37
  4. #8Business, Management and Accounting-
  5. #5Chemical Engineering-
  6. #12Chemistry-
  7. #6Computer Science#69
  8. #7Decision Sciences-
  9. #8Dentistry-
  10. #6Earth and Planetary Sciences#34
  11. #8Economics, Econometrics and Finance-
  12. #6Energy-
  13. #5Engineering#54
  14. #4Environmental Science#49
  15. #5Health Professions-
  16. #7Immunology and Microbiology-
  17. #6Materials Science-
  18. #12Mathematics-
  19. #9Medicine#40
  20. #9Neuroscience-
  21. #7Nursing-
  22. #9Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmaceutics-
  23. #12Physics and Astronomy-
  24. #5Psychology#41
  25. #7Social Sciences#55
  26. #6Veterinary-

Standing is the percentile of world rank within each field, 2022-now; the printed number is the rank itself. A dash means the field is too small there to rank. How sides are compared.

The numbers behind each field

Click a heading to sort. The side that does better in a pair of columns is shaded: a lower rank, a higher rate, more works.

Field Australia rankIceland rank Australia top 10%Iceland top 10% Australia worksIceland works
Agricultural and Biological Sciences #6 - 15.4% - 12k -
Arts and Humanities #9 #40 14.3% 12.6% 9.7k 249
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology #8 #37 13.0% 12.4% 16k 228
Business, Management and Accounting #8 - 16.3% - 9.8k -
Chemical Engineering #5 - 15.5% - 779 -
Chemistry #12 - 12.8% - 2.8k -
Computer Science #6 #69 16.7% 5.8% 20k 255
Decision Sciences #7 - 15.0% - 3.7k -
Dentistry #8 - 18.7% - 1.1k -
Earth and Planetary Sciences #6 #34 14.0% 11.0% 6.3k 221
Economics, Econometrics and Finance #8 - 12.4% - 8.1k -
Energy #6 - 17.0% - 2.7k -
Engineering #5 #54 16.2% 11.3% 37k 443
Environmental Science #4 #49 14.3% 9.1% 21k 428
Health Professions #5 - 15.4% - 16k -
Immunology and Microbiology #7 - 13.3% - 3.6k -
Materials Science #6 - 15.8% - 6.8k -
Mathematics #12 - 13.5% - 2.5k -
Medicine #9 #40 14.0% 11.3% 80k 971
Neuroscience #9 - 12.8% - 7.1k -
Nursing #7 - 15.7% - 1.9k -
Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmaceutics #9 - 14.2% - 814 -
Physics and Astronomy #12 - 12.5% - 5.8k -
Psychology #5 #41 16.5% 9.0% 18k 304
Social Sciences #7 #55 16.0% 9.1% 47k 831
Veterinary #6 - 14.8% - 738 -

What is each known for?

The keywords that describe each side's research, by fractional works in 2022-now and weighted toward what it does more of than the world.

Australia

▲ more of its work than of the world's◆ about the world's share▼ less than the world's
All 40 words, with their numbers
  1. Epidemiology21k▲ 1.37×140 topics
  2. Climate Change15k▲ 1.45×132 topics
  3. Machine Learning11k▼ 0.86×97 topics
  4. Deep Learning11k▼ 0.79×85 topics
  5. Mental Health9,669▲ 1.74×48 topics
  6. Sustainability9,393◆ 0.99×140 topics
  7. Globalization9,017▲ 1.18×185 topics
  8. Public Health8,739▲ 1.54×77 topics
  9. Inflammation8,511◆ 1.03×83 topics
  10. Quality of Life8,357▲ 1.49×61 topics
  11. Risk Factors6,421▲ 1.50×37 topics
  12. Environmental Impact6,048◆ 0.91×74 topics
  13. Cardiovascular Disease5,888▲ 1.33×39 topics
  14. Depression5,660▲ 1.65×26 topics
  15. Treatment5,636▲ 1.19×52 topics
  16. Oxidative Stress5,147▼ 0.80×63 topics
  17. Healthcare5,064◆ 1.14×44 topics
  18. Social Media4,900◆ 0.91×41 topics
  19. Resilience4,114▲ 2.1×19 topics
  20. Metabolic Syndrome4,006▲ 1.27×24 topics
  21. Genetics3,863▲ 1.40×27 topics
  22. Biodiversity3,847▲ 1.30×38 topics
  23. Identity3,769▲ 1.34×79 topics
  24. Social Support3,667▲ 1.75×20 topics
  25. Mortality3,644▲ 1.65×13 topics
  26. Prevalence3,622▲ 2.3×15 topics
  27. Global Burden3,532▲ 1.66×12 topics
  28. Anxiety3,449▲ 1.86×12 topics
  29. Aging3,396▲ 1.60×19 topics
  30. Physical Activity3,364▲ 1.78×13 topics
  31. Ethics3,337▲ 1.69×62 topics
  32. Primary Care3,139▲ 2.2×15 topics
  33. Ethical Considerations3,109▲ 2.3×21 topics
  34. Adolescents3,045▲ 2.1×11 topics
  35. Neoliberalism2,940▲ 2.1×30 topics
  36. Health Equity2,880▲ 2.5×6 topics
  37. Vulnerability2,625▲ 2.9×9 topics
  38. Population Dynamics2,566▲ 2.6×13 topics
  39. Health Disparities2,466▲ 2.4×9 topics
  40. Decolonization1,706▲ 5.4×8 topics

Iceland

▲ more of its work than of the world's◆ about the world's share▼ less than the world's
All 40 words, with their numbers
  1. Climate Change398▲ 2.5×100 topics
  2. Epidemiology292▲ 1.23×130 topics
  3. Sustainability196▲ 1.35×88 topics
  4. Globalization185▲ 1.58×95 topics
  5. Mental Health156▲ 1.83×41 topics
  6. Inflammation143◆ 1.13×76 topics
  7. Remote Sensing110▲ 1.52×31 topics
  8. Environmental Impact109◆ 1.08×52 topics
  9. Public Health104▲ 1.20×59 topics
  10. Quality of Life97◆ 1.13×52 topics
  11. Cardiovascular Disease96▲ 1.41×37 topics
  12. Treatment93▲ 1.29×49 topics
  13. Risk Factors87▲ 1.33×36 topics
  14. Depression87▲ 1.66×22 topics
  15. Biodiversity78▲ 1.72×34 topics
  16. Literature72▲ 2.2×37 topics
  17. Meta-Analysis67▲ 1.92×18 topics
  18. Resilience67▲ 2.3×17 topics
  19. Invasive Species66▲ 2.6×20 topics
  20. Religion64▲ 2.3×29 topics
  21. Prevalence63▲ 2.6×14 topics
  22. Arctic62▲ 9.4×4 topics
  23. Fisheries Sustainability60▲ 12×2 topics
  24. Labor Market58▲ 3.5×14 topics
  25. Governance56▲ 2.9×16 topics
  26. Aquaculture51▲ 3.4×8 topics
  27. International Relations49▲ 3.4×17 topics
  28. Hydrology45▲ 5.8×4 topics
  29. Plate Tectonics44▲ 4.9×3 topics
  30. Medieval43▲ 21×3 topics
  31. Financial Crisis41▲ 6.2×12 topics
  32. Holocene40▲ 6.0×3 topics
  33. Freshwater Biodiversity36▲ 9.9×2 topics
  34. Shipping35▲ 12×2 topics
  35. Banking Sector34▲ 43×3 topics
  36. Iceland34▲ 138×1 topic
  37. Socioeconomic Inequality34▲ 69×1 topic
  38. Oil and Gas33▲ 16×2 topics
  39. Maritime Transport33▲ 21×1 topic
  40. Northern Sea Route33▲ 21×1 topic

Size is fractional works in the topics tagged with each word; colour is the word's share of the side's work against its share of the world's. Each word links to the topic it comes from most.

How has their output grown?

Australia has out-published Iceland every year since 1980.

still counting50k100kAustralia88k in 2025Iceland1,335 in 20251990200020102020

Fractional works per year.

Their share of all research

Growing output can still be a shrinking share, because all of science grows. Each line is a side as a percentage of every work published that year.

still counting1.0%2.0%3.0%Australia1.5% in 2025Iceland0.023% in 202519801990200020102020

Fractional works over all fractional works that year. How the balance of science has shifted.

How much of it reaches the world top 10%

The share of each side's works, year by year, that reached the world's 10% most cited for their field and year. The average of all institutions is 10.0% (why not 10%).

still counting10%20%Australia14.5% in 2025Iceland10.3% in 2025200020102020

A year with under 1% of the side's peak output is left out: a rate over a handful of papers says nothing. The latest years are still being cited.

Who holds more of the world's best institutions?

A country's average quality and the number of institutions it holds at the very top can disagree, and both are worth knowing. The counts are nested: an institution in the top 50 is also in the top 100.

Australia 50 Iceland
  1. 3In the world top 500
  2. 5In the top 1000
  3. 19In the top 5000
  4. 35In the top 1,0001
  5. #6Elite capacityrank among 204 countries#42

Institutions ranked on research quality, 2022-now. Elite capacity counts a country's institutions by their worldwide rank, weighted so a place at #1 counts for more than one at #480.

Which publishes more research, Australia or Iceland?

Australia publishes 66.3× as much research as Iceland in 2022-now (343k against 5.2k fractional works).

Whose research has more impact, Australia or Iceland?

15.0% of Australia's research reaches the world's top 10% most cited, against 10.0% for Iceland.

Is Australia or Iceland growing faster?

Output in 2022-25 was +11% against 2018-21 for Iceland, and -3% for Australia.

Which has more open access research, Australia or Iceland?

46% of Iceland's research is free to read, against 40% of Australia's.

Which has more world-class institutions, Australia or Iceland?

Australia holds 5 of the world's top 100 research institutions and Iceland 0; in the top 1,000 it is 35 against 1.

Which institutions lead in each country?

The highest-ranked institutions on each side on research quality, 2022-now. The percentage is each institution's own top-10% rate: the share of its works that are among the world's 10% most cited for their field and year. Every figure stands alone, so they do not add up to 100%.

Australia

  1. 1The University of Melbourne14.9% top 10% · 23k works
  2. 2UNSW Sydney15.7% top 10% · 19k works
  3. 3Monash University16.1% top 10% · 20k works
  4. 4The University of Queensland15.0% top 10% · 20k works
  5. 5The University of Sydney14.4% top 10% · 25k works
  6. 6Australian National University13.7% top 10% · 11k works

Iceland

  1. 1University of Iceland10.7% top 10% · 2.7k works
  2. 2Reykjavík University13.8% top 10% · 690 works
  3. 3Directorate of Health4.1% top 10% · 610 works
  4. 4University of Akureyri7.6% top 10% · 236 works
  5. 5Matís (Iceland)3.4% top 10% · 84 works
  6. 6Árni Magnússon Institute for Icelandic Studies8.9% top 10% · 70 works

The number is the rank inside the country. The track on each row is the top-10% rate; the tick is the average of all institutions, 10.0% (how it is set): teal above it, red below. The ranking is the quality score, which compares the rate with what each institution's own topics predict and adds a small reward for size, so the rates do not fall in order.

Who are the top researchers on each side?

The most cited researchers on each side, among those ranked.

Australia

  1. 1 Seyedali Mirjalili #9 worldwide 154k citations · 823 works
  2. 2 Weng Marc Lim #78 worldwide 42k citations · 417 works
  3. 3 Shulei Chou #90 worldwide 63k citations · 657 works
  4. 4 Shi‐Zhang Qiao #130 worldwide 159k citations · 811 works
  5. 5 X. J. Zhu #134 worldwide 95k citations · 301 works

Iceland

  1. 1 Unnur Arna Thorsteinsdottir #13 worldwide 144k citations · 597 works
  2. 2 Kāri Stefánsson #43 worldwide 211k citations · 1,140 works
  3. 3 Augustine Kong #84 worldwide 97k citations · 293 works
  4. 4 Guðmar Þorleifsson #122 worldwide 120k citations · 579 works
  5. 5 Daniel Fannar Gudbjartsson #133 worldwide 88k citations · 524 works

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