Citation counts on Google Scholar tell you how many times a paper was cited. Scite.ai (scite.ai) tells you whether those citations supported or contradicted the paper’s findings — a categorically more useful piece of information for evaluating evidence.
What Scite Does Differently
Scite analyzes 1.2 billion citation statements and categorizes each as: Supporting (the citing paper confirms or builds on the finding), Contrasting (the citing paper disputes or fails to replicate the finding), or Mentioning (cited for background or context without directly engaging with the finding). This transforms a number into a research narrative.
A paper with 200 citations that splits 80 supporting / 100 contrasting / 20 mentioning tells a very different story than 180 supporting / 5 contrasting / 15 mentioning. The former signals a contested finding; the latter signals a well-replicated one.
Practical Uses
Evaluating whether a paper you want to cite is well-supported or contested in the literature — critical for not building your argument on shaky ground. Finding replication failures: if a prominent neuroscience paper has 30 contrasting citations including from the original lab’s attempts to replicate, that’s important context. Finding the strongest evidence for a claim: filter for papers with high supporting ratios.
The Assistant Feature
Scite Assistant lets you ask questions like “What does the literature say about X?” and generates an answer with citing statistics. It shows the supporting/contrasting breakdown for each key claim in its answer — giving you evidence quality information alongside the finding itself.
Pricing and Access
Scite has a limited free tier (basic citation statistics). The full product runs $20/month or ~$144/year. Many universities have institutional access — check your library portal before paying individually. For researchers whose work depends on understanding replication and contested claims (medical research, social science, neuroscience), it’s worth the individual subscription.
