Can you really publish 20-40 articles a day?

Introducing my new white paper: The myth of the academic superstar - or why name disambiguation is crucial

Anne-Wil Harzing - (updated Wed 18 Mar 2026 08:32)

What would you say if I told you some academics publish 20-40 articles a year in journals listed in the Web of Science, not just as a one off, but every year for a decade (or more)?

I guess your answer would depend on which discipline you are in. If you work in the Social Sciences or the Humanities, you will probably respond that such a sustained level of high productivity is unlikely without engaging in some form of fraudulent behaviour. If you work in the (Life) Sciences, you may conclude that the academics in question are workaholic directors of big research laboratories, or participants in one of the many huge research consortia churning out numerous papers with hundreds or even thousands of authors each.

But what would you say if I told you that some academics publish 20-40 articles every month year after year. Regardless of your discipline, I suspect your answer would be that this this is simply impossible without engaging in seriously fraudulent behaviour.

So, what if I told you some academics publish this much not in a year, not in a month, not in a week, but in a single day, every single day for a decade (or more)! And that their outlets were not shoddy predatory journals (see Strange journal invitations popping up in my inbox every day), but official Web of Science listed journals. Hopefully, you would have enough common sense to realise that even with a generous dose of GenAI support and engagement in serious academic misconduct this simply isn’t possible.

So how then is it possible that in the Web of Science Essential Science indicators ranking of the world’s top-1% most cited academics:

  • no less than fifteen academics publish 20-40 articles a day, 365 days a year.
  • the top-100 academics all publish at least 7 articles a day, 365 days a year.
  • more than 2,000 academics publish at least an article a day, 365 days a year.
  • more than 11,000 academics publish at least 100 articles a year, every single year.

Very simple. Most of these academics are not individuals, they are amalgamations of several, and in some cases dozens or even hundreds, of academics with the same name. So, I will call these academics “academic entities”. The only question that remains is: why has nobody noticed this? 

In my latest white paper I dive into this and related questions. So if you want to get to the bottom of this, please join me for the ride here: The myth of the academic superstar - or why name disambiguation is crucial. 

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Copyright © 2026 Anne-Wil Harzing. All rights reserved. Page last modified on Wed 18 Mar 2026 08:32

Anne-Wil Harzing is Emerita Professor of International Management at Middlesex University, London. She is a Fellow of the Academy of International Business, a select group of distinguished AIB members who are recognized for their outstanding contributions to the scholarly development of the field of international business. In addition to her academic duties, she also maintains the Journal Quality List and is the driving force behind the popular Publish or Perish software program.

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