If you’ve published a research output in a book, in a conference proceedings or journal, you may have an online identity that you are not aware of and it might not be accurate.
Why do I need to check my profile?
If your details in Scopus are incorrect, your publication record will be incomplete and possibly confusing to those interested in reading or citing your research. It will also mean that the bibliometric information that you can access via your Scopus Author Profile will be inaccurate.
Data from Scopus are also used in some of the University rankings (for example, the QS University Rankings) - If your publications are attributed to the wrong institution, your publication record and citation metrics will not be included in your actual institution's score.
For Reading research staff: It is also worth checking out your Scopus Author ID to make sure that the articles attributed to you are correct because the bibliometric data used by the University of Reading are taken from the Scopus database via SciVal. If your details are wrong, unreliable data will be pulled through into the University’s reporting process. The new CRIS system, due to be implemented in 2026, will also link to Scopus.
Finding your Scopus Author profile
To check your Scopus Author profile, visit the Scopus website (University of Reading authors can sign in using your Institutional login) or use the free to access preview version if your institution does not subscribe to Scopus).
Choose the ‘Author Search’ tab from the Search menu and enter your details.
If you’ve worked at several institutions it is best to leave the affiliation information blank. When the search results appear, look for your name and for any possible duplicates. You can reduce the number of options by choosing 'Show exact matches only' on the top left of the search page. it is also possible to refine the results based on the affiliation, city and country/territory of the author.
Click on your name to bring up the details page with a list of the publications attributed to you.
If your details are right
Great! Take a look at how your papers/articles are being cited, view your citation and analyse your author output (h-index, documents by source and type, documents by subject, coauthors and citations, contribution to SDGs, topics).
It is recommended that you link your Scopus Author Profile to your ORCID ID if you have one – check out our ORCID Library guide for help on how to do this. Check your Scopus Author Profile from time to time to make sure that new publications are being added correctly. You can also set up an alert that will email you when new publications are added.
If your details are wrong
If you have several Author Profiles or there are publications in your profile that do not belong to you, you can ask Scopus to merge them. You can do this by using the ‘Edit profile’ link or use the Scopus Author Feedback Wizard (or contact Karen Rowlett, the University’s Research Publications Adviser who can do this on your behalf). It is worth checking that any missing publications have not been attributed to another researcher of a similar name. Corrections are usually done within 2-4 weeks.
If you are not sure how to check your Scopus Author ID or need help in sorting out your profile, please contact Karen Rowlett, Research Publications Adviser. There are also some regular sessions running through People Development on Managing your digital researcher profile and ORCID. You can check when the next course is running by searching the People Development course database.
In the Scopus database, outputs from authors with the same name, email address, affiliation, subject area, citations and coauthors are aggregated in to a Scopus Author ID. An author profile is created automatically when two or more articles are linked to one name. As the information is collated automatically, you may find that the wrong articles have been attributed to you or that your articles have been split across several duplicate IDs. This is a particular problem if you have a common name, have moved institutions regularly or have changed your area of research.
Each author is assigned a Scopus ID number and the details of their publications are listed. Any citations to the outputs are counted and some bibliometric data are calculated for the author.
Features of the profile
Affiliations: The Scopus author profile includes information on your current and previous affiliations (click on 'show all information' to see additional data). This view will also list any possible author matches. It is worth checking these to see if any of the profiles could also contain your outputs.
Possible author matches: Check for duplicate profiles by clicking on the 'Show all information' link or on the 'More' link. You can do minor edits yourself but they will take a couple of weeks to take effect. Contact the University's Research Publications Adviser for help with more complicated corrections.
Impact: The impact tab will give details of your contributions to the UN Sustainable Development Goals and show the percentage of outputs with international collaboration and academic-corporate collaboration. The last 10 years of publications are considered in this analysis.
Cited by: This tab shows all the works that have cited your outputs. The list can be sorted, downloaded or transferred to SciVal for further analysis.
Preprints: This tab will show any preprints that you have produced from 7 major preprint servers.
Co-Authors: Your co-authors and the number of papers that you have collaborated on are listed in this tab and can be analysed further.
Topics: Your outputs are assigned to SciVal topics. The name of the topic, along with the Field Weighted Citation Impact of your papers is given. Further analysis can be made in SciVal.
Awarded Grants: Scopus will show funding awards for an author from a selection of key global funders.
The Scopus database collates outputs from thousands of journals and other publications and tracks citations to them. The database is useful for searching for articles relevant to your research, helping you to decide where to publish, identifying potential collaborators and also helping you to discover who is citing your work and how often it is being cited.
In 2025 the Scopus database included over 100 million records. The database also included over 404 thousand books and over 2.6 million preprints from major preprint servers.
