ACL 2026 deadline

Key dates

1. ARR October cycle: Full paper

   Mon, Oct 6, 2025 · 23:59 AoE

2. ARR January cycle: Full paper

   Mon, Jan 5, 2026 · 23:59 AoE

3. ARR commitment; reviewed papers only: Full paper

   Sat, Mar 14, 2026 · 23:59 AoE

4. Conference

   July 5-7, 2026 · San Diego, California, United States (Hybrid)

What ACL reviewers will look for

ARR reviews are about half a page. The form separates objective Soundness (must be justified in the text) from subjective Excitement, and the Overall Assessment is an outcome recommendation (Award / Conference / Findings / Resubmit), all on 1–5 with half points. Weaknesses are a numbered list specific enough for an AC to follow; suggested extra work goes under Comments. The guidelines list lazy-reviewing heuristics to avoid, e.g. "not novel" without a reference, "not SOTA", "simple method", "only tested on English", "I would have done X", or listing limitations the authors already acknowledge.

Overall score

Overall Assessment, 1–5 (top: “Consider for Award”)

Sub-scores

Soundness, Excitement, Reproducibility, Datasets, Software (1–5)

Written fields

Paper Summary · Summary Of Strengths · Summary Of Weaknesses · Comments Suggestions And Typos · Best Paper Justification · Limitations And Societal Impact · Ethical Concerns · Needs Ethics Review

Author checklist

Responsible NLP Research Checklist, 18 items

Where the bar sits. ARR publishes no cutoff; venue senior ACs decide. Rule of thumb: average Overall Assessment ≥ 3.5 → main conference plausible, 3.0–3.5 → Findings, < 3.0 → likely rejected. Main conference acceptance is about 20–25%, plus ~13–15% Findings.