NeurIPS 2025 Call For Competitions
NeurIPS 2025 Call for Competitions We are glad to announce the nineth edition of the competition track at NeurIPS 2025. Through this call, we solicit competition proposals on topics of interest to the NeurIPS community. We especially encourage submissions with a clear scientific question and from fields with a positive societal impact, particularly those leveraging AI to support disadvantaged communities. Besides societal impact, we seek proposals in areas where machine learning can positively advance other scientific, technological, or business domains of relevance to the NeurIPS community. We hope that interesting competitions will attract a significant cross-section of interdisciplinary and diverse communities to our NeurIPS 2025 competition track. NeurIPS 2025 will be hosting a Competition Track, with a dedicated workshop for each accepted competition, where results will be presented and discussed by participants and organizers. The Competition Track is currently planned to be held in person at NeurIPS. Authors are asked to confirm that their submissions accord with the NeurIPS code of conduct and code of ethics . PROPOSAL SUBMISSION Competition proposals must be submitted via OpenReview at: https://openreview.net/group?id=NeurIPS.cc/2025/Competition_Track Note: Newly created profiles in OpenReview can take up to two weeks for approval, please plan accordingly. Please carefully follow the following Latex template when preparing proposals. https://www.overleaf.com/read/cmyydmzcqpdf#2414af Note that the guidelines and template have been updated from last year. The main text of the submitted proposal is limited to eight content pages, including all figures and tables. Additional pages containing the team members biography and references do not count as content pages. REVIEWING AND SELECTION PROCESS A competition program committee will be formed, consisting of experts on both machine learning and challenges organization. Each proposal will be reviewed by members of the program committee. The factors that will be considered when evaluating proposals include: Scientific Relevance and Task(s): Competitions should be motivated by clear scientific questions and curiosity. Impact, originality, and relevance to the NeurIPS community will all be considered. Tasks that include humanitarian and/or positive societal impact are highly encouraged, although other topics relevant to the NeurIPS community are also welcomed. If humanitarian projects are submitted, the involvement of the community in question is strongly desired, and “parachute science” is strongly discouraged. Ethical considerations, including potential risks associated with the task and dataset, should be carefully addressed. Evaluation Protocol: Feasibility of the task, baseline availability, sufficient data for training and testing algorithms to solve the proposed task, soundness of the evaluation criteria, and clarity and fairness of the competition rules will all be evaluated. Proposals should also address potential feature leakage and ensure the evaluation aligns with real-world task performance. Logistics: The competition schedule, plan for attracting competition participants, and experience and diversity of the organizers will all be considered. The specific plan for attracting competition participants, including groups under-represented at NeurIPS, will be important during the review process. The review process is single-blind, so the submissions should include the organizers’ identities (i.e., not anonymized). PROCEEDINGS Similar to last year, there are two options for accepted competitions in 2025 to submit their post-competition analyses: As papers to the 2026 NeurIPS D&B track (next year), which involves a standard paper review process without a guarantee of acceptance. Submit to a PMLR volume (e.g., https://proceedings.mlr.press/v220/) dedicated to NeurIPS competitions, where acceptance is guaranteed after a light-weight review. IMPORTANT DATES (anywhere on earth) Competition proposal submission deadline: April 20, 2025 Acceptance notification: May 18, 2025 2025 Competition track: December 6-7, 2025 ADDITIONAL COMMENTS Competition organizers should propose a timeline for running the competition to ensure participants have enough time to contribute high-quality entries. It is recommended that competitions be launched in May and completed by the end of October 2025 at the absolute latest. Competition organizers that require help or suggestions regarding competition platforms for running the competition can contact the competition chairs for advice. 2024 accepted competitions 2023 accepted competitions 2022 accepted competitions 2021 accepted competitions 2020 accepted competitions 2019 accepted competitions 2018 accepted competitions 2017 accepted competitions COMPETITION CHAIRS Jes Frellsen, DTU Kun Zhang, CMU and MBZUAI Tao Qin, Microsoft Research Contact: competition-chairs Successful Page Load NeurIPS uses cookies for essential functions only. We do not sell your personal information. Our Privacy Policy » Accept
Executive Summary
The NeurIPS 2025 Call for Competitions aims to solicit proposals for competitions that address topics of interest to the NeurIPS community, particularly those with a positive societal impact and leveraging AI to support disadvantaged communities. The competition track will feature a dedicated workshop for each accepted competition, where results will be presented and discussed. The proposal submission process involves a thorough review by a competition program committee, considering factors such as scientific relevance, task feasibility, and evaluation protocol. The call encourages proposals that address humanitarian and positive societal impact, while also welcoming other topics relevant to the NeurIPS community. The competition track is scheduled to be held in person at NeurIPS.
Key Points
- ▸ Competition proposals are solicited for topics of interest to the NeurIPS community
- ▸ A focus on positive societal impact and leveraging AI to support disadvantaged communities is encouraged
- ▸ A dedicated workshop will be held for each accepted competition
- ▸ The proposal submission process involves a thorough review by a competition program committee
Merits
Encouraging Positive Societal Impact
The call for competitions encourages proposals that address humanitarian and positive societal impact, which can lead to meaningful advancements in the field and benefits for disadvantaged communities.
Interdisciplinary and Diverse Communities Engagement
The competition track aims to attract a significant cross-section of interdisciplinary and diverse communities, promoting collaboration and knowledge sharing among researchers and practitioners from different backgrounds.
Demerits
Limited Scope
The call for competitions may have a limited scope, focusing primarily on topics with positive societal impact and leveraging AI to support disadvantaged communities, which might exclude other relevant and interesting topics.
High Expectations
The proposal submission process involves a thorough review by a competition program committee, which may lead to high expectations and strict evaluation criteria, potentially discouraging some researchers and practitioners from submitting proposals.
Expert Commentary
The NeurIPS 2025 Call for Competitions demonstrates a clear commitment to promoting positive societal impact and leveraging AI to support disadvantaged communities. The competition track provides a valuable opportunity for researchers and practitioners to engage with interdisciplinary and diverse communities, share knowledge, and develop innovative solutions. However, the limited scope of the call for competitions may exclude other relevant and interesting topics, and the high expectations and strict evaluation criteria may discourage some researchers and practitioners from submitting proposals. Nevertheless, the competition track has the potential to lead to meaningful advancements in the field and benefits for disadvantaged communities, making it a valuable contribution to the AI and machine learning research community.
Recommendations
- ✓ Researchers and practitioners should carefully review the guidelines and submission criteria to ensure their proposals align with the call for competitions.
- ✓ The competition program committee should strive to maintain a balanced and diverse review process, considering a range of perspectives and expertise to ensure the evaluation criteria are fair and effective.
