Proceedings of the IEEE Submission Guide

Source: Clarivate JCR 2024, IEEE editorial disclosures (accessed April 2026).

Source: Proceedings of the IEEE regular-paper author guidance.

Use this page when deciding:

• whether the proposed Review is tutorial-style

• whether the author team has engineering authority

• whether the topic adds a new perspective beyond existing surveys

• a clear tutorial-Review framing

• author authority with primary-research record

• difference from existing reviews, surveys, and tutorials

• broad engineering relevance

• a detailed cover letter with author qualifications and background citations beyond the author team's own work

• Research-paper framing rather than tutorial Review.

• Author standing in narrow specialty without broad engineering authority.

• Topic recently covered in Proceedings of the IEEE.

• Engineering relevance is narrow.

Proceedings of the IEEE is among the highest-impact engineering Review journals.

Tutorial-Review standard: the journal differentiates from IEEE Transactions journals (research papers) and IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutorials (specialty surveys) by demanding broad-engineering tutorial Reviews.

Authority expectation: editors weigh sustained primary-research records and broad engineering visibility.

Long planning horizon: invitations often planned 12-18 months ahead.

The strongest Proceedings of the IEEE cover letters establish:

• the tutorial-Review framing

• the author authority

• the difference from existing surveys, reviews, and tutorials

• the broad engineering relevance

Method note: the comparison reflects published author guidelines and Manusights internal analysis. We have not personally been Proceedings of the IEEE authors; the boundary is publicly documented editorial behavior. Pros and cons are based on documented editorial scope.

• Is Proceedings of the IEEE a good journal?

Before upload, run your proposal through a Proceedings of the IEEE tutorial readiness check.

This guide tells you what Proceedings of the IEEE editors look for in a regular-paper proposal; the review tells you whether your paper clears the tutorial, breadth, and authority check before upload. Manusights checks are covered by a 60-day money-back guarantee, and we do not train models on submitted manuscripts.

The research paper that has not become a tutorial review

For manuscripts targeting Proceedings of the IEEE, the most consistent mismatch is a technically strong research-paper extension presented as if it were a tutorial, review, or survey. Proceedings of the IEEE explicitly wants broad, long-range tutorial, survey, and review papers for electronics, electrical engineering, and computer science communities. It is not a normal IEEE Transactions outlet for new experimental results.

The manuscript components need to prove the distinction. The cover letter should state the coverage type, explain the technology's broad importance, and show how the manuscript differs from existing surveys. The abstract should introduce the field and the interpretive contribution rather than leading with the authors' own latest method. The figures should teach a technology map, taxonomy, architecture, tradeoff space, or future direction. The references should extend well beyond the authors' work and beyond one narrow subcommunity.

If the manuscript is mainly a primary-research paper, it likely belongs in an IEEE Transactions journal, IEEE Access, IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutorials, ACM Computing Surveys, or a specialty venue.

Check whether your Proceedings of the IEEE manuscript is truly tutorial in scope →

The author-authority paragraph that is too narrow for the audience

For Proceedings of the IEEE proposals, author authority is often under-written. The paper may have a respected technical team, but the cover letter does not show why this team can explain the field to non-specialist engineers across related areas. Proceedings guidance asks prospective authors to be recognized experts with a distinguished publication record and the ability to communicate technical concepts to a broad audience.

That authority case should appear in concrete manuscript components. The cover letter should connect author biographies to the specific technology area, include selected prior publications or scholarly profiles, and explain why the team covers the full survey space rather than one viewpoint. The introduction should frame the readership beyond one lab community. The references should include competing schools of thought, historical foundations, standards, deployments, limitations, and future directions. The figure plan should make complex material teachable.

If the expertise is deep but narrow, adding a senior coauthor, reframing the scope, or moving the manuscript to a narrower IEEE journal may be the stronger path.

Check whether your Proceedings of the IEEE author case is broad enough →

The survey that summarizes papers without creating new perspective

For manuscripts targeting Proceedings of the IEEE, the third pattern is a survey that is comprehensive but not interpretive. It catalogs papers, groups methods, and reports benchmarks, but it does not provide the novel insight, new perspective, critical evaluation, pros and cons, future direction, or implementation guidance the journal asks regular papers to provide.

The fix should be visible in the manuscript architecture. The outline needs an organizing principle, not just chronology. The tables should compare methods by tradeoff, deployment constraint, assumption, dataset, or systems implication. The figures should explain architecture and decision logic, not only reproduce standard diagrams. The discussion should identify unresolved barriers and future prospects across the technology area. The cover letter should say why this Proceedings of the IEEE paper changes how the field is understood.

If the manuscript is a systematic literature review without critical synthesis, it will look closer to a database exercise than a Proceedings paper.

Check whether your Proceedings of the IEEE survey adds a new perspective →

Before the reviewer-invitation stage, read the Proceedings of the IEEE package against the same risks this guide flags in the Manusights section. The practical question is whether the abstract, cover letter, figures or tables, methods, reporting statements, supplementary files, and references all make the journal choice obvious.

• If the abstract still points toward research paper that has not become a tutorial review, revise the central claim before upload.

• If the evidence package leaves author-authority paragraph that is too narrow for the audience, strengthen the methods, controls, figures, or supplementary material rather than expecting reviewers to infer it.

• If the cover letter cannot resolve survey that summarizes papers without creating new perspective, compare the target journal against the adjacent venues named above before submitting.

In pre-submission diagnostic work for top broad-engineering review journals, we consistently see four signals that distinguish strong proposals from weak ones. First, the proposal must be tutorial-style. Second, the author record should show sustained engineering visibility in the subfield. Third, the proposal should differentiate sharply from reviews published in the prior five years. Fourth, engineering relevance should be broad.

For Proceedings of the IEEE-targeted manuscripts, the single most consistent feedback class we deliver in pre-submission diagnostics is the research-paper-versus-tutorial distinction. Proceedings of the IEEE editors expect tutorial-style synthesis that introduces and consolidates a broad engineering area. Cover letters framed as "we extend our recent research findings to address X" fail to explain why the paper belongs in a tutorial venue.

We coach authors to articulate the tutorial framing explicitly. Cover letters framed as "we present a tutorial review that introduces engineering area X to the broad IEEE community, organizing the field around principle Y and providing accessible foundations for future research" receive better editorial traction.

The same logic applies across tutorial review journals: editors are operating with limited slot inventory, and the submissions that get traction articulate the tutorial framing.

For Proceedings of the IEEE-targeted manuscripts, beyond the rubric checks, three pre-submission diagnostic patterns recur most often in the proposals we review for Proceedings of the IEEE. First, cover letters that begin with original research findings rather than the tutorial framing lose force in editorial scanning. Second, cover letters where the author authority section emphasizes specialty publications without broad engineering visibility are flagged for authority concerns.

Third, manuscripts that lack engagement with Proceedings of the IEEE's recent issues are at risk of being told the proposal does not fit the publication conversation.

For Proceedings of the IEEE-targeted manuscripts, the strongest proposals we coach distinguish themselves on three operational behaviors. First, they keep the cover letter focused and use it to make the case for tutorial framing, author authority, and significance. Second, they include a one-sentence elevator pitch. Third, they identify the specific recent Proceedings of the IEEE articles that the manuscript builds on and the specific gap the review will address.

Proceedings of the IEEE requires these at first submission:

• Cover letter justifying the survey or tutorial framing (Proceedings publishes overview and integrative work, not primary research)

• IEEE copyright transfer agreement (signed at acceptance, but acknowledged at submission)

• Four or more suggested reviewers with no recent collaboration history

• Author biographies, 60-150 words each, technical-focus

• Author photographs (1-inch square, high-resolution; required for accepted papers but uploaded at submission)

• Statement of competing interests for all authors

Authors should also include explicit references to prior IEEE work the manuscript builds on. Proceedings expects integrative framing across multiple IEEE Transactions venues.

For Proceedings of the IEEE submissions, the most common artifact-related issue is authors treating the manuscript as a primary-research submission. Proceedings requires the survey or tutorial framing in the cover letter, otherwise editors redirect to a specialty IEEE Transactions venue.

For Proceedings of the IEEE submissions, the editorial timeline runs through four phases. Proceedings is one of the slower review cycles in IEEE because the editorial bar is integration and breadth, not just technical correctness.

Day 0 to 10: Manuscript Central intake and editor assignment

ScholarOne intake handles format compliance plus IEEE author-disclosure requirements. The handling Editor assignment lands within 10 days; Proceedings uses a smaller editorial board than typical IEEE Transactions, so wait times can extend during conference season. Submissions missing the survey or tutorial framing are returned for cover-letter revision before scope screen.

Day 10 to 45: Editor scope and integration screen

Proceedings editors apply a strict integration filter: does the manuscript synthesize across multiple subfields or methods? The most common Day 10-45 desk reject in our review work: deep but narrow technical papers that should have gone to a specialty IEEE Transactions journal. Proceedings rejects primary-research framing even when the underlying work is strong.

Week 6 to 24: Peer review

Standard 4-6 reviewers (more than typical IEEE Transactions; Proceedings uses broader expertise pools). The 3-6 month first decision is common at this stage. Reviewer dialogue is detailed and lengthy; reviewers expect explicit comparison to prior Proceedings surveys on adjacent topics.

Week 24 to 52: Decision, revision, and production

Major revision is standard at first decision. Proceedings revision rounds typically settle at 2 (rarely 3 for accepted papers). Total submission-to-acceptance: 9-15 months. Production adds 2-4 months after acceptance.

For authors deciding whether their work fits the Proceedings tutorial framing before investing this much review time, a Proceedings of the IEEE submission readiness check verifies the survey-or-tutorial framing matches the journal's actual filter.