Rejection from a legitimate journal, with reviewers recommending me to try a Beall's list journal

I am quite new to academia, is the above considered normal practice

No. This is abnormal and unacceptable for a reviewer or editor to suggest this.

Any advice of what I can do?

If the journal you submitted to really is legitimate, contact the editor and escalate this. Simply point out that the review you received pointed you to a predatory journal, and ask if the editor can reach out to the reviewer to see if this was a mistake.

Update: I found that a member of the editorial board of the SCIE journal, is also in the editorial board of the Beall's list journal.

This is a red flag, and the review you received is another red flag. These red flags suggest that the journal you submitted to is not reputable. I would check with online journal ratings, impact factor, etc. to make sure you are not already submitting to a very low-quality journal (even if it is not predatory).


First: it's likely you mistook the decision - it's not a reviewer's comment, it's the editor's comments, and they are desk rejecting your manuscript. In this case it is decently common for the editor to suggest another journal (especially if it's published by the same publisher). I would not find it a red flag if they did - it is after all only a suggestion which you are under no obligation to follow.

You write that the editor recommended a journal on Beall's list, but remember that Beall's list is not gospel, especially since it is now defunct and not being updated. There is a real chance that the editor does not consider the journal predatory, or even that the journal isn't predatory in the first place. The editor is very unlikely to have anything to gain if you submit to a predatory journal either - the other journal might not even know your paper has been referred.

If you do not want to submit to that journal (especially since it is open access with an APC), simply ignore the editor's suggestion and submit your paper elsewhere.

I found that a member of the editorial board of the SCIE journal, is also in the editorial board of the Beall's list journal.

This doesn't mean anything. It is conceivable that a reputable academic will elect to serve on the editorial board of a "predatory" journal (inverted commas because what is predatory isn't well-defined). Or it could be that the predatory journal is simply listing the editor's name without their consent. Either way, this doesn't say anything about the SCIE journal.

Even if this editorial board member is the editor who rejected your paper, it's still possible they are be acting with completely benign intentions (if your colleague told you their paper's been rejected from X journal and you knew of journal Y which would consider it, would you suggest it?). Bear in mind that if they are editorial board members of both journal they would have a pretty good idea of the standards of the other journal, and that your paper meets those standards.

I would take the fact that the journal is indexed by the SCIE as a very strong sign that the journal is reputable (anyone who's ever tried to get a new journal into the SCIE will be able to vouch for how difficult this can be).


This answer is on point. I will only add that it is common in some fields for editors to make such a suggestion; in such cases they offer to transfer the manuscript to another journal by the same publisher.

This practice is followed by a very reputable journal in my field of materials science/engineering. The second journal is new, doesn't even have an impact factor yet, but researchers appear to welcome this option, because it is affiliated to the primary, reputed journal.

The reason for adding this is that such practices are not always unethical; use your caution and check the referred journal. However, ensure that it is an actual transfer that is being proposed, not just a suggestion to resubmit (without the mechanism of carrying the submission/review history).

In the present case, I concur that you should report this reviewer to the editor.