The Contributor Role Taxonomy (CRediT) at ten: a retrospective analysis of the diversity of contributions to published research output

The Contributor Role Taxonomy (CRediT) was introduced in 2015 to improve transparency, accountability, and recognition in scholarly authorship by standardizing the description of contributor roles. This study aims to provide the first comprehensive retrospective system-wide analysis of global adoption of CRediT. A key challenge is that while support for CRediT has grown organically, among authors and publishers, implementation has been inconsistent across publishers, making systematic data collection difficult. To overcome this challenge, we used the Dimensions database and applied a multi-stage text-extraction method. Our analysis identified more than 3.2 million articles, preprints and conference papers including CRediT roles, from 2015 to 2024. Our results show accelerating adoption, with CRediT appearing in 22.5% of all 2024 publications with available full text. All 14 CRediT roles are now widely used, with notable growth in roles reflecting evolving research practices such as Software and Data Curation. Adoption spans disciplines and geographies, dominated by STEM but expanding into social sciences, and are strongly shaped by publisher policies, system integrations and disciplinary focus. We discuss the drivers of CRediT’s organic expansion, its role in strengthening research integrity and assessment, and the need for coordinated governance and infrastructure support as the taxonomy enters its next decade. Updates and standards of implementations will be important to ensure that CRediT remains relevant and valuable for its multiple use cases and aligned with how research itself is evolving.