The art of synoptic tables

This editorial of Vegetation Classification and Survey (VCS) focusses on how to prepare good synoptic tables. While synoptic tables are a core element for the standardised documentation of classification schemes, we regularly find that authors are challenged with preparing them in a concise and informative manner. Thus, we explain the key aspects of synoptic tables and how we handle them in VCS. The central information should always be the percentage constancy, not a constancy class (loss of information) nor the phi-value or any other measure of fidelity (because these depend on which other columns are included in the table). While in the main text there is usually only space for a shortened synoptic table (which should include the most frequent companion species), it is crucial that a full version is provided in the supplementary material, and the criteria for shortening and sorting should be documented transparently. On a more general note, VCS is generally doing well with a first Journal Impact Factor of 3.0 being published and the CiteScore constantly increasing. Finally, we present the four Editors’ Choice articles of the year, among which Joelson et al. (2025; Vegetation Classification and Survey 6: 37–56) won the Editors’ Award 2025. Abbreviations : VCS = Vegetation Classification and Survey.