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Journal Review Time Checker

How long will a journal take to accept your paper? Type its name for the full analysis: median days from submission to acceptance, the spread of its papers, your chances of acceptance within 1, 3 or 6 months, the dates if you submit today, its rank in its subject and faster journals in the same subjects.

Review time report

eLight

SCIEScopusJCR 2024Open accessIF 23.1
Journal page →
Median, submission to acceptance106 dayshalf the papers were faster
Middle half of papers81–128days
Fastest 10% / slowest 10%25 / 162days or less / days or more
Acceptance to online44 daysmedian
Papers counted46Nov 2024 to Sep 2026
How long papers in this journal took to be accepted
0306090120150180days from submission to acceptancemedian 1068112825162
Fastest 10% accepted within 25 daysMiddle half of the papers: 81–128 daysMedian: 106 daysSlowest 10% took over 162 days

Each paper took a different time. The green box holds the middle half of the papers and the dark line is the median; the whiskers reach the fastest 10% and the slowest 10%. Plan with the whole spread, not only the median.

How likely is acceptance within…

1 monthabout 11%
2 monthsabout 19%
3 monthsabout 34%
6 monthsover 90%
1 yearover 90%

Share of the papers this journal published that were accepted within that time, read from the spread above. Papers that were rejected are not in the data.

If you submit today

Today1 Nov 2026Submission
Fastest 10%26 Nov 2026accepted by
Half of the papers15 Feb 2027accepted by
9 in 10 papers12 Apr 2027accepted by
Online (median)31 Mar 2027after acceptance + 44 days

Dates are the journal's past pattern applied to today, not a promise: your time depends on the editor, the reviewers and your revisions. A desk rejection usually comes much sooner.

Compared with its subject

eLight is faster than 43% of the 45 journals in Optics that publish their review dates (rank 26, 1 = fastest).

060120180240eLight this journalmedian 106Optics medians of 45 journalsmedian 106days from submission to acceptance

For the journal: the spread of its papers. For each subject: the spread of its journals' median review times.

Faster journals in the same subjects

Journals in the same subjects with a shorter median review time (at least 20 papers counted):

JournalMedian daysSpreadIndexed inAccess
Optics Letters51SCIE, Scopus, JCR 2024Hybrid / subscriptionCompare
Journal of the Society for Information Display56SCIE, Scopus, JCR 2024Hybrid / subscriptionCompare
Atmospheric and Oceanic Optics58ESCI, Scopus, JCR 2024Hybrid / subscriptionCompare
Optical Materials Express61SCIE, Scopus, JCR 2024Open access · APC ~US$1,843Compare
Optics Continuum62ESCI, Scopus, JCR 2024Open access · APC ~US$1,372Compare
Optical Memory and Neural Networks63ESCI, Scopus, JCR 2024Hybrid / subscriptionCompare

Compare with other journals

Add up to 3 journals to see their review times on the same scale.

Next steps

Email me this reportThe review time of eLight, your expected dates, its rank in its subject and the faster journals in the same subjects, plus the journals you compared. Free.
Based on the received and accepted dates of 46 research articles published Nov 2024 to Sep 2026. Days from received to accepted, then the median and the spread. Updated 29 October 2026. Impact factor: 2-year citedness calculated by ScholarsColab, not the official Clarivate value. ScholarsColab is not affiliated with this journal; check the journal's website for its own figures.

Fastest review journals by field

Computer Science268 journals · fastest 24 daysEngineering592 journals · fastest 12 daysElectrical and Electronic Engineering140 journals · fastest 40 daysMechanical Engineering162 journals · fastest 16 daysCivil Engineering136 journals · fastest 12 daysChemical Engineering84 journals · fastest 40 daysMaterials Science289 journals · fastest 15 daysPhysics240 journals · fastest 6 daysChemistry263 journals · fastest 25 daysMathematics and Statistics346 journals · fastest 23 daysEnergy93 journals · fastest 33 daysEnvironmental Science and Ecology326 journals · fastest 54 daysEarth Sciences287 journals · fastest 20 daysLife Sciences and Biology759 journals · fastest 14 daysAgriculture and Food Science279 journals · fastest 5 daysMedicine1,412 journals · fastest 3 daysPharmacy and Pharmacology213 journals · fastest 3 daysNursing and Public Health308 journals · fastest 9 daysBusiness and Management239 journals · fastest 4 daysEconomics and Finance230 journals · fastest 15 daysEducation258 journals · fastest 5 daysPsychology and Psychiatry364 journals · fastest 18 daysSocial Sciences626 journals · fastest 4 daysArts and Humanities342 journals · fastest 4 days

All 241 subject categories →

Frequently asked questions

How is the review time of a journal measured?

Many research articles carry a received date and an accepted date. The checker counts the days between them for every article of the last 24 months and shows the median and the spread. Papers that were rejected are not in the data.

What is a normal review time?

Across 6,745 journals with data, the median time from submission to acceptance is 150 days. It ranges from a few weeks to many months by field and journal, and it includes every revision round.

Why is my journal not in the checker?

Only journals whose publisher publishes both dates can be measured. Springer Nature, Wiley, Taylor & Francis, BMC and Hindawi mostly do; Elsevier, IEEE, MDPI, Frontiers and SAGE mostly do not.

How likely is my paper to be accepted within 3 months?

Check the journal: the report reads the share of its papers accepted within 1, 2, 3, 6 and 12 months from the spread of its review times, and gives the dates if you submit today.

Related: Journal Finder · Fastest review journals · Guide: journal review time · APC Waiver Checker · Journal Directory