Dear Manjula Wijewickrema I think you're right, here it states:

https://www.bl.uk/issn

that currently (?, could not find when this message was created) ISSN assignment is for free. Sorry for any confusion about this, best thing is to ask the people behind it as Anton Vrdoljak indicated.

Best regards.

PS. Muhibul Haque Bhuyan good news that your journal is financially supported, always a good start for a new initiative.

https://portal.issn.org/faq

There is nothing mentioned about the publication of a journal without ISSN and also about the registration fee required for one journal.

Please contact sales [at] issn.org for more information.

It is not mandatory to obtain an ISSN for your publication. However, it is recommended to publish your serial with an ISSN. This number works in the similar way your (national/personal) identity card number works. It distinguishes your publication from others. The ISSN number is a unique number issued for a serial and records along with details such as the publisher, editorial board, contacts, frequency, price (if any), the cover page (may be), and so on. Thus, any serial publication registered with an ISSN can be easily raced using its ISSN. Apart from this, I do not believe that ISSN involves much with the concerns like reputation, impact, influence, and genuiness (because almost all predatory journals have ISSN numbers) of a publication. Obtaining this number is not that difficult. Usually, there is a local agency who deals/issues ISSN numbers and incorporated with the ISSN International Centre. For example, in Sri Lanka, this number is issued by the National Library and Documentation Services Board after submitting a formal application to them. Yes, you may need to pay a small handling fee to them, but this is a one-time payment.

Dear Muhibul Haque Bhuyan ,

A bit more info can be found here: https://www.issn.org/services/subscribe-to-the-register/pricing/ it seems to cost at least 922 euros. (update: wrong conclusion is subscription and not the cost for assignment)

As said by Manjula Wijewickrema it is highly recommended. However, looking at the fact that predatory journals have ISSN numbers (or simply steal it from another journal...) it is unfortunately by itself not enough to ensure, for potential researchers interested in your journal, that a journal is legit and genuine (knowing that there are so many fake ones around).

The same is true for assigning DOI nr to every paper, a good sign but requires payment as well. Not sure if you talk here about an already existing journal or a journal you want to start but depending on whether we talk about a subscription based or open access journal it (unfortunately and at the same time a good thing of course) requires quite some initial investments. Things like:

-ISSN

-DOI (and/or CrossRef member)

-Membership DOAJ

-Building a solid editorial board

-Building a good transparent website

-Setting up proper procedures for submitting manuscripts, peer review, waiver program for possible costs etc.

I suppose this is the reason why many (Society, University and other stand-alone) journals choose to operate in collaboration with a publisher like Springer Nature.

Good luck and kind regards.

Dear Rob,

I think 922 € that you have mentioned is for subscribing to the ISSN Portal and not for obtaining an ISSN for a publication outlet. I do not think the International ISSN Centre needs to charge such a huge amount to issue a single ISSN and no any journal is willing to pay that amount for obtaining an ISSN. However, if I am wrong, please correct me. Perhaps, the local ISSN agencies (National Centres) may need to register (with a deposit) with the International Centre before issuing ISSNs. May be one can find local agencies registered with the International Centre using the following link:

https://www.issn.org/the-centre-and-the-network/members-countries/the-issn-network-today/?#

Thank you Manjula Wijewickrema and Rob Keller for your comments and suggestions. From my department of electrical and electronic engineering, I am trying to publish a journal. It would be a non-profit journal and no processing charges will be taken from the authors, all costs will be borne by the university. You may see our website at www.seu.edu.bd/seujeee/

I will appreciate highly your insightful comments/suggestions or any contribution in terms of paper submission or recommendation.

Dear Manjula Wijewickrema I think you're right, here it states:

https://www.bl.uk/issn

that currently (?, could not find when this message was created) ISSN assignment is for free. Sorry for any confusion about this, best thing is to ask the people behind it as Anton Vrdoljak indicated.

Best regards.

PS. Muhibul Haque Bhuyan good news that your journal is financially supported, always a good start for a new initiative.

Thank you Manjula Wijewickrema for your suggestions but the link is not working from here in Bangladesh. There is no local ISSN center in Bangladesh as far as I know. However, I also believe that the fee should be very low but there is no email or contact person on their website where I may communicate for the further clarification and nothing is mentioned about what the payment is to get an ISSN number.

Thank you Rob Keller too for your suggestions but the link you provided is for UK publishers. I am working in Bangladesh and the new journal will be published in Bangladesh.

Dear Bhuyan,

I am sorry, I don't know why it doesn't work in your country. However, yes, as you have mentioned, Bangladesh is not in the list of ISSN member countries. That means, you may not have a local centre. The following contacts are given on their website as the contacts for ISSN requests:

email: [email protected]

tel: +33 1 44 88 60 91

Try one of these contacts. Good luck!

I will try this.

Thank you very much Manjula Wijewickrema

Sir, Apply to ISSN international office.

It will cost a very small amount and after verification, ISSN international office will provide an ISSN serial for you.

In case if you need any help, let me know. I have applied for one of my journals ISSN serial number from Bangladesh. And no received easily.

How much did you need to pay? How did you pay? Sheikh Abujar

Thank you all the honorable discussants for your kind contribution. Finally, I could apply and pay the fee online for the ISSN Number for our journal, Southeast University Journal of Electrical and Electronic Engineering (SEUJEEE).

http://www.seu.edu.bd/seujeee/index.php

I am humbly requesting you to submit your paper to our journal if you are in the relevant fields (http://www.seu.edu.bd/seujeee/scopes.php) or alternatively you may forward the link to the prospective authors.

I've gone through this discussion and it helped me a lot. Just a few queries.. Is the journal need to be published in hard copy format? How much does it costs? Would you please point out the requirements and process? Muhibul Haque Bhuyan

Mahbubul Haq Yes we will publish both hard and soft copies. There are no special requirements. This depends on your university's policies how they want to publish a journal. However, in my opinion, every journal should have an ISSN, an online version, and they should try to include their names in the online databases. A journal should also try to publish papers from home and abroad to have diversity.