Publishing a paper is a process with eight recognisable stages, and most of the time lost by first-time authors is lost in two of them: choosing the wrong journal, and treating the first rejection as the end rather than the middle. This guide walks the whole route, with the decisions that matter at each step.
What are the stages of publishing a paper?
There are eight: finish the manuscript, choose a target journal, format to that journal's requirements, write the cover letter, submit, wait through peer review, revise in response to reviewers, and complete production after acceptance. Everything else is a variation on those.
The order matters more than people expect. Choosing the journal before the final formatting pass saves a full rewrite, because structure, word limits and reference style all follow from that choice.
How do you choose the right journal?
Match the journal's scope to your paper's actual contribution, not to its prestige. The most common cause of desk rejection is a paper that is perfectly sound but sits outside what the journal publishes — an editor sees that in ninety seconds, and no amount of quality overcomes it.
A practical method:
- List the five to ten papers you cite most heavily. Where were they published? That is your candidate list, because you are already in conversation with those journals.
- Read the aims and scope statement, then read three recent papers from the last two issues. If your paper would look out of place beside them, it will.
- Check the indexing before anything else — see how to check whether a journal is Scopus or SCI indexed.
- Check the acceptance rate and average time to first decision, where the journal publishes them.
How long does it take to publish a paper?
Between three months and two years, with most papers in the sciences landing between six and twelve months from submission to publication. The largest and least predictable component is peer review, covered in how long peer review actually takes.
| Stage | Typical duration |
|---|---|
| Formatting and submission preparation | 1–2 weeks |
| Editorial screening (desk decision) | 3 days – 3 weeks |
| Peer review, first round | 6 weeks – 4 months |
| Your revisions | 2–8 weeks |
| Peer review, second round | 2–8 weeks |
| Production and proofs | 2–6 weeks |
What does formatting to a journal involve?
Matching the author guidelines exactly: structure, word limits, reference style, figure resolution, table format and file types. This is unglamorous, and it is where a surprising number of submissions are returned before review.
Work from the journal's own guidelines page rather than a template a colleague gave you, which may be years out of date. Where a journal offers a submission template, use it.
Does the cover letter matter?
Yes, more than most authors think, because it is the first and sometimes only thing the handling editor reads before deciding whether to send your paper out for review. Keep it to one page and answer three questions: what did you find, why does it matter to this journal's readership, and why is it appropriate here.
Do not summarise your abstract. The editor has the abstract.
What happens after you submit?
An editor screens the paper, and if it passes screening it goes to two or more reviewers. The possible outcomes are accept (rare on a first decision), minor revisions, major revisions, reject with encouragement to resubmit, and reject.
Major revisions is a good outcome. It is the most common route to acceptance in most fields. Handling it well is a distinct skill — see how to respond to reviewer comments.
What should you do if the paper is rejected?
Revise using whatever feedback you received and submit to your second-choice journal, usually within a week. Rejection is the ordinary case rather than the exception: strong journals routinely reject 70–90% of submissions, and most published papers were rejected somewhere first.
The only wasted rejection is one you do not learn from. If the reason was scope, change journal. If it was clarity, fix the writing. If it was a methodological gap, address it before resubmitting.
Where does outside support help most?
At journal selection and at the revision stage, because those are the two points where an experienced outside reader changes the outcome rather than the polish. CiteWise Research works with authors across the whole route — you can see what that support covers, and the fee is payable only once a journal accepts the paper.
