This review examines some of the characteristics and highlights some notable articles of the Journal of Crustacean Biology (JCB) in its first 30 years of existence. A total of 2052 articles appeared in JCB from the first issue in February 1981 to the end of 2009. The number of articles by volume increased from 50 in 1981 to 93 in 2002 and then declined to around 70. From 1981 to 2009, article size varied around a mean of 11 pages (pre-2005 format) but mean number of authors and references by article increased by a factor of 1.87 and 2.20, respectively. JCB content is predominated numerically by taxonomy and systematics (36% of all articles), but other research areas (anatomy, physiology, development, growth-reproduction, life history, behavior, ecology, conservation) were also represented from the outset. JCB's 2-year impact factor increased significantly from 1991 to 2009. Longer-term impact of JCB is evident in the fact that almost half of all JCB articles were cited in 2009 and that the mean age of those cited articles was only slightly less than the mean age of all JCB articles (12.6 vs 13.3 years). However, citations to JCB differ widely across research areas, with articles in taxonomy cited on average at less than half the rate of articles in the areas of ecology or conservation. The most cited JCB articles by combination of research area and decade of publication deal primarily with higher crustaceans (malacostracans) and are reviews or original research articles with cross-disciplinary appeal.