When searching for a suitable journal, I came across npj Wireless Technology as suggested by someone in my network. This is a brand-new journal launched in 2025 that does not yet have an impact factor and is not yet indexed in the standard lists. Usually I would dismiss it for this reason, but after some digging I changed my mind. It has now been accepted and available in open-access: https://www.nature.com/articles/s44459-026-00031-4.
This article explains how npj (short for Nature Partner Journal) fits into the broader Nature Portfolio:
The npj Series are online open access journals, published in collaboration with preeminent scientists, and developed in close partnership with their respective research communities. Each journal in the series brings together strong editorial leadership and world-class publication infrastructure to deliver high-quality, peer-reviewed original research to the global scientific community. Multidisciplinary in scope, each journal offers authors a high-quality, highly visible open access option for their research, covering disciplines in both applied and basic science.
To be clear: this is not the same as the flagship Nature journal nor journals such as Nature Physics (although "Nature Wireless Communications" does not exist).
There are three reason why I strongly believe in this journal:
(1) The editor-in-chief and associate editors of this journal are indeed preeminent contributors to the field. Their h-index is regularly above 80 and at least 7 out of 9 are IEEE Fellows. By 7 September 2026, the journal had published 59 research articles. Of the first 13 papers published, 5 have authors with an h-index above 100 (an exceptional feat) which are each household names in the field such as prof. Theodore Rappaport.
(2) The 24 sister npj journals in Nature’s 2025 metrics table average 9.1 with two of them going over 15 (npj Flexible Electronics, npj Digital Medicine). Wireless communications is a fairly well-cited field so I suspect npj Wireless Technology to land above the average.
(3) The current landscape in telecommunications journals (according to Clarivate's JCR) means that the prospective impact of npj Wireless Technology would likely land among the top 5 or top 10.
| Journal | IF |
|---|---|
| IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutorials | 46.7 |
| IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications | 17.2 |
| IEEE Wireless Communications | 11.6 |
| IEEE Transactions on Consumer Electronics | 10.9 |
| IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications | 10.7 |
| Satellite Navigation | 10.1 |
| IEEE Transactions on Multimedia | 9.7 |
| Progress in Electromagnetics Research | 9.3 |
| IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing | 9.2 |
| IEEE Internet of Things Journal | 8.9 |
| IEEE Communications Magazine | 8.3 |
| IEEE Transactions on Communications | 8.3 |
| IEEE Vehicular Technology Magazine | 7.6 |
| Internet of Things | 7.6 |
| Digital Communications and Networks | 7.5 |
Below are some quotes of the partnered editors:
"I've added npj Wireless Technology to my list of go-to venues for our best work. They conducted a rigorous, fair, and swift review process and handled the manuscript thereafter without any nonsense." - Todd Humphreys
"npj Wireless Technology is a new and ambitious open-access journal in the Nature Portfolio. (...) These collections are led by outstanding guest editors and aim to highlight high-impact research shaping the future of wireless technologies." "These first articles mark the beginning of what we hope will become a leading venue for cutting-edge advances shaping the future of wireless technologies." - Mohamed-Slim Alouini
"Nature Portfolio is among the most respected publishing platforms globally, and npj Wireless Technology is rapidly emerging as a premier venue for the wireless community." - Abdulkadir Celik
Having received an APC waiver from them, and being very satisfied with the peer-review process, I welcome anyone in my network to publish your next research with them. And no, this is not a sponsored message! 😉
You can always shoot me a message at robin.wydaeghe@ugent.be!