Research Guides: PubMed: PubMed Alternatives

PubMed vs. PubMed Central vs. Medline

MEDLINE, PubMed, and PubMed Central are distinct entities, so it's important to understand their differences and how they work together.

MEDLINE is the National Library of Medicine database of 31 million references to biomedical and life science journals dating back to 1946. MEDLINE indexes 5,200 journals from around the world using the NLM controlled vocabulary, Medical Subject Headings (MeSH). The MEDLINE database is searchable through the PubMed platform as well as many other search services that obtain the data from the NLM such as Ebsco, Embase, Ovid, and many more.

PubMed is the interface or platform of the National Library of Medicine that includes 36 million citations for the biomedical literature sourced from the MEDLINE database, additional life science journals, online books from the NLM, pre-prints, and more. PubMed is referred to as 'Public MEDLINE' because it's available to anyone to search for free.

PubMed Central is a free archive of full-text biomedical and life sciences journal articles. It is a repository for journal literature deposited by participating publishers, as well as for author manuscripts that have been submitted in compliance with the NIH Public Access Policy. Most, but not all of PMCs content is indexed (searchable) in PubMed.

Subscription Databases with access to MEDLINE

Medline Ultimate
Searchable citations for over 5,600 biomedical journals with full text available for more than 1,650 titles. See a full list of the titles available here.
Embase
Embase includes six million+ records and 2,900+ journals that are not covered by MEDLINE including international journals. Over 30 million abstracts and indices from published, peer-reviewed biomedical literature, in-press publications and conferences are available on Embase. Full-text indexing of drug, disease and medical device data, supported by the Embase thesaurus Emtree, facilitates precise searching.
ClinicalKey
A multipurpose learning platform with ebooks, journals, procedure videos, multimedia, clinical overviews, drug monographs, calculators, guidelines, patient education and more.
Learn more about using ClinicalKey with our short video!

PubMed Alternatives

Google Scholar is a free, comprehensive database. Though not specific to biomedical research, it does include a variety of biomedical and scientific content. Google Scholar can also be helpful for locating grey literature, articles on named instruments, and citation tracking. Google Scholar integrates with the Belmont University Libraries and includes a search alert system. If a PubMed alternative is needed, it is a potential option for researchers to use. Some studies have been done comparing Google Scholar and PubMed in terms of their search quality, and one noted that Google Scholar retrieved twice as many relevant articles than PubMed, with similar precision for search terms, and provided significantly more access to free full-text content (Shariff et al., 2013).

Shariff S, Bejaimal S, Sontrop J, Iansavichus A, Haynes R, Weir M, Garg A
Retrieving Clinical Evidence: A Comparison of PubMed and Google Scholar for Quick Clinical Searches
J Med Internet Res 2013;15(8):e164
URL: https://www.jmir.org/2013/8/e164
DOI: 10.2196/jmir.2624

To access Google Scholar and learn more about searching, follow the links below:

Google Scholar
use the Library Links section of Google Scholar Settings (when you are logged in) to find materials available in the Lila D Bunch Library (the main library at Belmont) even from off-campus

Google and Google Scholar
by Sarah Keil Last Updated Mar 28, 2025 49 views this year