Why journals get discontinued
Both Scopus and Web of Science re-evaluate the titles they cover, and both discontinue journals that fall below their criteria. Common grounds include publication concerns, editorial standards slipping, and citation behaviour that looks manipulated.
Discontinuation is not rare and it is not always dramatic. A journal may be dropped for sustained failure to publish on schedule as readily as for anything scandalous. The effect on authors is the same either way.
Clarivate also suppresses metrics for individual journals in the Journal Citation Reports where citation behaviour looks anomalous, which is a separate action from removing coverage entirely.
Indexing is a rolling assessment, not a permanent award. A journal indexed on the day you submitted may not be on the day you publish.
What happens to your published paper
The paper stays published. It keeps its DOI, its citation record, and its place in the literature. Records already in the index generally remain there — coverage is normally discontinued from a stated date forward rather than retroactively erased.
That distinction matters enormously and is widely misunderstood. If your paper appeared while the journal was covered, it usually remains a Scopus-indexed paper. If it appeared after the discontinuation date, it does not.
So the first thing to establish is the discontinuation date, and whether your article precedes it. That single fact determines most of what follows.
What it means for assessment
For a thesis or a promotion case, institutions vary. Many count what was true at publication; some assess against current status. Ask your institution rather than assuming, and ask in writing.
For visa petitions and similar evidence-based assessments, the venue's standing is one part of a wider picture — what tends to carry more weight is independent citation and demonstrable uptake of the work, which delisting does not touch.
Practically: document the position now. Save a dated record showing the journal's coverage at the time of publication, keep your acceptance and publication dates, and note your paper's own citation record. Reconstructing this later is much harder than capturing it today.