On the 16th, internationally renowned academic publishing house Springer Nature released the “Nature Index - Research Cities,” focusing on changes in high-quality research output in major global cities and metropolitan areas on journals tracked by the Nature Index for 2024. Among the global top ten cities in scientific research, China's representation increased from five seats in 2023 to six in 2024, marking the first time Chinese cities comprise more than half of the top ten list.
Beijing has maintained the global number one position since 2016, with Shanghai firmly in second place. Other top scientific research cities worldwide in 2024 are the New York Metropolitan Area, Boston Metropolitan Area, Nanjing, Guangzhou, San Francisco Bay Area, Wuhan, Baltimore–Washington, and Hangzhou, in that order.
In terms of ranking changes among Chinese cities, Guangzhou rose from eighth in 2023 to sixth, surpassing the San Francisco Bay Area; Wuhan continued to climb by one more spot; Hangzhou jumped from 13th in 2023 into the top ten.
Looking at the adjusted share score—a key indicator in the Nature Index—between 2023 and 2024, Beijing's scientific research output saw an increase of over 9%, and Shanghai nearly 20%, while the share scores of all U.S. cities in the global top ten declined over the same period.
Analyzing the performance of research cities within the five major disciplines tracked by the Nature Index, Chinese cities continued to dominate the rankings for chemistry, physical sciences, and earth & environmental sciences. Notably, for the first time, Chinese cities swept all top ten spots in global chemistry, and held six places each in the other two fields, with Beijing ranking first in all.
In the life sciences, Western cities still maintain the lead, with New York and Boston claiming the first two spots and Beijing ranking third.
In the health sciences—a field newly included in the Nature Index in 2022—U.S. cities occupy half of the top ten, with Beijing ranking sixth. Shanghai and Guangzhou also entered the top ten rankings in these two fields, with Guangzhou showing significant growth.
According to public information, the Nature Index is compiled by Nature Index Analytics, part of Springer Nature, and has been released since 2016. It serves as a public database including author affiliation information and institutional relationships, tracking institutional contributions to scholarly papers published in 145 high-quality natural science and health science journals. All journals are selected by independent expert panels based on reputation. In addition to the overall rankings, there are also rankings for four subject branches: physics, chemistry, earth sciences, and life sciences.