Figure requirements of 100 high-impact journals: resolution, size, typography, colour and file formats (dataset, 2026)

<p><br></p><p dir="ltr">This dataset documents the figure requirements of the 100 journals with the highest two-year mean citedness in OpenAlex, as stated in their author instructions and in the publisher-wide artwork guides they link to.</p><p><br></p><p dir="ltr">All 113 source documents were captured on 30 September 2026. Fifteen requirements were coded for each journal: minimum resolution for photographs, bitmap line art and combination art; single-column and full-page figure widths; typeface; minimum and maximum text size; colour mode; colour-vision guidance; vector-graphics requirements; accepted file formats; graphical abstract status and size; relaxed rules at first submission; and alt text.

Each of the 934 coded values is linked to a verbatim quotation from its source document, and an automated substring test confirms every quotation against the captured text.</p><p><br></p><p dir="ltr">Files: sampling frame (frame.csv), publisher groups (groups.csv), coded values with quotations (specs_long.csv), one row per journal (specs_wide.csv), contradictions between documents of the same publisher (conflicts.csv), source list with URLs and capture times (sources.csv), summary statistics (summary.json), codebook (codebook.md) and the capture, coding and analysis scripts (code/).</p><p><br></p><p dir="ltr">Full-text captures are not redistributed for copyright reasons and are available from the author on request.</p>