Comparison of SMFs from J-PLUS DR3 and the GAEA simulation. (a) Total SMF from J-PLUS DR3 (orange circles), our GAEA-based sample using raw snapshot data and J-PLUS-like selection (purple squares), and the GAEA2023 model predictions published in De Lucia et al. (2024) (dotted green curve). We also plot the total SMF from Xu et al. (2025) (dash-dotted blue curve). (b) Q-SMFs derived using different thresholds in the range −11 < log(sSFR_lim) <  − 10 (shaded orange-purple curves), compared with J-PLUS DR3 (red squares) and GAEA2023 from De Lucia et al. (2024) (dotted green curve). (c) SF-SMFs from J-PLUS DR3 (blue triangles), with GAEA predictions for varying log(sSFR_lim) (shaded orange-purple curves). The dashed black line corresponds to log(sSFR_lim) = − 10.4, the value adopted for consistency with J-PLUS DR3, while the solid black line shows the same selection after applying a −0.3 dex stellar mass shift to the SF-SMF.