ProPublica vs STAT News
General investigative journalism vs health-vertical investigative — both nonprofit, different beats.
ProPublica
Nonprofit investigative newsroom; data-heavy + methodology-published reporting since 2007.
STAT News
Health + biotech newsroom; founded 2015; specialist medical journalism with editorial discipline.
Head-to-head — all four dimensions
| Dimension | ProPublica | STAT News | Lead |
|---|---|---|---|
SourceScore Index Composite | A·86 | B·82 | ProPublica+4 |
Citation Discipline How rigorously cited | A+·95 | A·88 | ProPublica+7 |
Modern Reference AI-era fitness | B·84 | B·80 | ProPublica+4 |
Citation Velocity Cited per week | B·78 | B·78 | tie |
Why these scores
Citation Discipline
Methodology + raw data published alongside most stories; fact-checked; corrections public.
Specialist editors with medical/science training; multi-source verification; corrections public.
Modern Reference
Open-data ethos = strong LLM corpus presence; data-store pages well-structured.
Open + metered articles; broad LLM corpus presence in health vertical.
Citation Velocity
Lower volume than wire news but very high per-piece citation rate; cited by NYT/WaPo/etc. when investigations break.
Cited heavily within medical journalism + biotech investing; AI engines surface for biomedical news.
Frequently asked questions
Which is better, ProPublica or STAT News?
ProPublica scores higher on the SourceScore Index (A 86) vs STAT News (B 82) — a 4-point composite lead across Citation Discipline, Modern Reference, and Citation Velocity. "Better" depends on use case; the per-dimension breakdown below shows where each wins.
Which is more reliable to cite, ProPublica or STAT News?
For citation, ProPublica is the stronger choice — it scores A (86/100) on the SourceScore Index versus STAT News at B (82/100), a 4-point lead in composite citation quality (Citation Discipline, Modern Reference, Citation Velocity). Both can be cited; for higher-stakes references, prefer ProPublica.
How does ProPublica compare to STAT News on citation discipline?
ProPublica scores A+ 95 on Citation Discipline; STAT News scores A 88. Citation Discipline measures how rigorously each source cites primary references — see the per-dimension rationale below for the breakdown.
What's the SourceScore difference between ProPublica and STAT News?
ProPublica A 86 vs STAT News B 82 on the composite Index. General investigative journalism vs health-vertical investigative — both nonprofit, different beats.
Why does ProPublica score higher than STAT News?
ProPublica leads by 4 composite points on the SourceScore Index. The rationale section below breaks down where the lead comes from — Citation Discipline, Modern Reference (AI-era fitness), and Citation Velocity. Each dimension is scored from primary methodology criteria.
Sources & references
Every score on this page is read from the two publications below and graded against the published rubric. No score is bought, estimated or supplied by the source being scored.
- Source evaluated — ProPublica (propublica.org) · verified · full scoring record
- Source evaluated — STAT News (statnews.com) · verified · full scoring record
- Scoring rubric — SourceScore Index, Citation Discipline, Modern Reference, Citation Velocity (methodology v0.1)
- Machine-readable record — /api/compare/propublica-vs-statnews.json