What we learned from NeurIPS 2020 reviewing process

Now that the reviewing period is over, we would like to share with you some statistics and insights about the reviewing process we used this year. We received 12115 abstract submissions, which resulted in 9467 full paper submissions. Compared to 2019, the number of submissions increased by 40%, which is very similar to the growth from 2018 to 2019. After more than three months of hard work from our reviewers, area chairs and senior area chairs (thank you, all!!), we have accepted exactly 1900 papers, including 105 oral presentations and 280 spotlight presentations. Note that this year we introduced "Social Aspects of Machine Learning", with topics like fairness and privacy.