Welcome Poster Authors!
For 2026, we reimagined the Poster’s Track to accept a plurality of content types. We wanted to give all the incoming authors some last minute guidance to help you finalize your submission while reading the Posters CFP and looking at the submission system. Submissions are still non-archival and content can be reused in future work.
The first thing you’ll note is the submission page length is reduced (now 6 pages long in single column format excluding references) from previous years and your submission will require more careful editing.
Next, in PCS you’ll see a new option to set the “Main Focus” of the article. You’ll see the following options list right after the Abstract field in PCS.
- Provocations that challenge assumptions in HCI (think: “Will AI take over our jobs?”)
- Presents systems or toolkits (e.g., an open-source library that researchers can build on)
- Focused case studies (e.g., what you learned rolling out a new VR app in a school)
- Presents a prototype that deserves visibility and feedback
- Short but comprehensive studies (quantitative or qualitative) that tell a concise story
- Other (please specify)
There are some new options here, so we’d like to illuminate what these are. The purpose of this new block is to help guide reviewers on how to properly read and evaluate your submission. You can select multiple options too. If you’re missing the alt.chi or case-studies tracks or want to know about the new focus areas, read on!
Provocations that challenge assumptions in HCI
Generally speaking, previous alt.chi submissions will fit into this category. If you have a provocation with a comprehensive study, you can select both options too but know it will be reviewed under both considerations of “challenge assumptions in HCI” and provide a “comprehensive study”. Our goal is to provide flexibility for authors, but given the shorter page length, claiming two things may be arduous. Similar to the rest of the Posters track, these submissions are reviewed in the same process and not the ‘open format’ as the previous years of alt.chi.
Presents systems or toolkits
Systems contributions can rejoice with this new submission focus! In particular, we welcome open source contributions which are becoming critical to the future of human-centered computing and evaluating AI. Making an anonymous OSS contribution can be difficult especially when you want to highlight code hosted on a public repository. Here we’d recommend using an open framework like https://osf.io/ to host your code and data. It’s an extra step but easy to set up and mirror a Github repo for an anonymous submission. Upon acceptance, you can update the links in your article to the main repo (or keep them pointing to osf.io and just mark the entry as non-anonymous before publication).
Focused case studies
Case Study papers can be submitted here. Please note the submission should not reveal the authors in the paper header. We do understand that for some Case Study submissions, it may be necessary to reveal where the case study was conducted to highlight the contribution. Submissions of this category (and only of this category’s sole selection) will be granted some easement (e.g., naming an institution, organization, city, or deployment context when essential to understanding the case, while avoiding direct identification of the authors) with regards to anonymity in the text.
Presents a prototype that deserves visibility and feedback
Prototypes are also new for 2026. Unlike a system or toolkit, a prototype provides an application instance and not a reusable library. You can of course submit one article that embodies both by selecting this and a toolkit. We hope this submission area can bring more experimentation and early applications into the CHI conference.
Short but comprehensive studies (quantitative or qualitative) that tell a concise story
This one is pretty self explanatory and bears similarity to the previous ‘late-breaking work’ category overall. Just a reminder (again) remember there are fewer pages with the requirements are ‘comprehensive study’ with a ‘concise story’. It’s a great submission area for complete shorter vignettes that you can present, get feedback, and roll into future work.
Other
Here you can write in a custom description. We do welcome new types but note that unlike the prescribed categories; how it will be reviewed falls upon the review committee. Choose wisely.
We hope this gives all the authors some improved visibility into the new Posters Track and submission types. Best of speed and luck finalizing your submissions!
CHI 2026 General Chairs, Technical Program Chairs, and Posters Chairs.
Feature Image Photo by Jakub Żerdzicki on Unsplash.