Oikos publishes original and innovative research on all aspects of ecology, defined as organism-environment interactions at various spatiotemporal scales, so including macroecology and evolutionary ecology. Emphasis is on theoretical and empirical work aimed at generalization and synthesis across taxa, systems and ecological disciplines. Papers can contribute to new developments in ecology by reporting novel theory or critical empirical results, and "synthesis" can include developing new theory, tests of general hypotheses, or bringing together established or emerging areas of ecology. Confirming or extending the established literature, by for example showing results that are novel for a new taxon, or purely applied research, is given low priority.

Oikos發表關于生態學所有方面的原創和創新研究，定義為不同時空尺度上的有機體-環境相互作用，包括宏觀生態學和進化生態學。重點是理論和實證工作，旨在推廣和綜合跨類群，系統和生態學科。論文可以通過報道新的理論或關鍵的實證結果來促進生態學的新發展，而“綜合”可以包括發展新理論、檢驗一般假設，或將生態學的現有或新興領域結合起來。確認或擴展已建立的文獻，例如顯示一個新的分類單元的新結果，或純粹的應用研究，被給予較低的優先級。