MDPI Editorial Process

MDPI operates an editorial process designed to ensure rigorous, transparent, and timely peer review. Quality, fairness, and efficiency are central to this process. Editorial decisions are made by Academic Editors, supported by MDPI’s Editorial Office, the SuSy manuscript submission system, and in house tools that help manage submissions, reviewer communication, and quality checks.

The flowchart below provides an overview of the editorial and production processes, which together represent the MDPI publication process.

The MDPI publication process.

For a description of editorial roles and their responsibilities in the editorial process, please see our For Editors page.

Pre-check consists of a technical pre-check performed by the Editorial Office and an editorial pre-check performed by an Academic Editor.

Technical & Ethics Pre-Check

After submission, the Editorial Office completes a technical pre-check. This initial screening verifies that the manuscript meets the minimum requirements for consideration by an Academic Editor and complies with the journal’s publication ethics guidelines.

This evaluation includes, but is not limited to, the following:

• Adherence to the journal’s Instructions for Authors and MDPI’s Research and Publication Ethics policies;
• Overall legibility of the manuscript and appropriate article type selection and associated requirements;
• Ethics and research integrity screening using a combination of manual and automated tools to flag potential issues.

If potential issues or flags are detected, the Editorial Office will alert the Academic Editor. Manuscript submissions that fail technical pre-check to the extent that further review is prevented, either due to the presence of significant issues or lacking information, will not proceed to further review.

If no potential issues are identified, the manuscript is then assigned to an MDPI staff member in the Editorial Office, who coordinates the handling of the submission and acts as the primary liaison between the authors, reviewers, and the Academic Editor.

Before sending the manuscript to the Academic Editor for an editorial pre-check, the MDPI staff member will compile a list of proposed reviewers for the Academic Editor to validate. This includes the following:

• Author-recommended reviewers: Authors may suggest potential reviewers during submission. The Editorial Office screens these suggestions for conflicts of interest and suitability.
• Editorial Office-proposed reviewers: The Editorial Office may also propose additional reviewers.

Authors may additionally enter the names of potential reviewers they wish to exclude from the peer-review process. The Editorial Office will respect these requests if they do not interfere with the objective and thorough assessment of the submission.

All proposed reviewers must meet the journal’s reviewer selection criteria, including requirements related to expertise, independence and conflict of interest.

Editorial Pre-Check and Validation of Reviewers

An Academic Editor is invited to perform an editorial pre-check of the manuscript. At this stage, the Academic Editor assesses whether the manuscript fits the journal’s scope and meets the expected standards of scientific soundness.

Following the editorial pre-check, the Academic Editor may reject the manuscript, request revisions before peer review, or move the manuscript forward to peer review. If the manuscript proceeds to peer review, the Academic Editor assesses the suitability of reviewers proposed by the Editorial Office and the authors, and may approve or modify the list of reviewers to be invited.

No person listed as an author may review or make an editorial decision on their own submission, as this would constitute a conflict of interest. APC related information is not shared with Academic Editors who are making editorial decisions. This is in adherence with COPE Guidelines on ensuring fairness and independence in decision making.

The review process is single-blind for most journals, meaning that authors do not know the identity of the reviewers, while reviewers know the identity of the authors. Some MDPI journals operate double-blind peer review, where neither authors nor reviewers know each other’s identities. The Proceedings Series journals operate using different peer-review standards specific to conference proceedings.

The Editorial Office invites the reviewers approved by the Academic Editor. At least two review reports are collected for each manuscript that proceeds to peer review.

Reviewers who accept a review invitation are generally given 7–10 days to submit their review report via our online platform, SuSy. Extensions are common and can be granted upon request.

When reviewing a revised manuscript, reviewers are asked to provide their report within three days. Extensions can also be granted upon request.

To assist Academic Editors, the Editorial Office handles communication with reviewers, authors, and the Academic Editor. Academic Editors can check the status of manuscripts at any time and may discuss the review process with the Editorial Office at any stage.

MDPI journals allow authors to choose Open Peer Review. Under Open Peer Review, review reports and author responses to reviewers are published alongside the article, providing greater transparency.

To promote openness and increase the robustness of peer review, we encourage reviewers to sign their reports so that their names appear on the review report. This is referred to as open identity. By signing their reports, reviewers can receive direct credit for their contribution to the review process and show their commitment to promoting Open Science. The default option is for reviewers to remain anonymous.

If a submission is rejected, no review reports, author responses, or reviewer details are published.

Once a minimum of two review reports have been received, the assigned Academic Editor evaluates the adequacy of the reviewers’ comments and the overall scientific soundness of the manuscript. This first editorial decision is required before the manuscript can proceed to the next stage.

The Editorial Office supports the Academic Editor’s evaluation of the review reports, including through internal tools designed to detect templated reports and flag potential reviewer self-citation requests.

The Academic Editor can make one of the following decisions: accept in current form, minor revision, reconsider after major revision, reject and decline resubmission, reject and encourage resubmission, or ask for an additional reviewer(s).

If the Academic Editor requests minor revision or reconsider after major revision, the decision will be communicated to the authors by the Editorial Office. Generally, authors are given five days for minor revision and ten days for major revision. Extensions are granted on request.

Revised manuscripts may or may not be sent back to reviewers, depending on the reviewers’ recommendations and whether they requested to see the revised version. Reviewers who request major revision or recommend rejection will always be sent the revised manuscript. All reviewers can access the most recent version of the manuscript via SuSy.

Up to two rounds of major revision are usually allowed per manuscript. More rounds of revision may be facilitated if recommended by the Academic Editor. For manuscripts that require extensive revision, the Academic Editor may decide to reject the manuscript and encourage resubmission. In such cases, authors may choose to resubmit their manuscript to the same journal upon completion of revisions. The resubmitted manuscript receives a new manuscript ID and is linked to the original submission. Following resubmission, the editorial process will continue as normal. The same reviewers will be invited to review the resubmitted manuscript.

Should the Editorial Office be unable to maintain communication with the author during review or production, the journal reserves the right to withdraw the manuscript following a designated period of inactivity.

Decisions to accept or reject manuscripts are made exclusively by the assigned Academic Editor. When making a decision, we expect the Academic Editor to check the following:

• The adequacy of reviewer comments and author response;
• The overall scientific quality of the manuscript.

The Academic Editor can make one of the following decisions: accept in current form, accept after minor revision, reject and decline resubmission, or reject and encourage resubmission.

The Academic Editor should alert the Editorial Office of any potential conflicts of interest that may bias, or be perceived to bias, the decision-making process. For more information, please read MDPI's conflicts of interest policy for Academic Editors.

Reviewers make recommendations; the Academic Editor is free to disagree with their views. If they do so, they should justify their decision for the benefit of the authors and reviewers.

In some instances, an Academic Editor may support the acceptance of a manuscript despite a reviewer recommending that it be rejected. In this scenario, the Editorial Office will seek a second independent opinion (double decision) from an Editorial Board Member or the Editor-in-Chief before communicating a final decision to the authors. The double decision, provided
by an Editorial Board Member or the Editor-in-Chief, is the final decision.

Articles can only be accepted for publication by an Academic Editor. Employed MDPI staff will then inform the authors. MDPI staff never make decisions regarding manuscript acceptance.

Authors may appeal a rejection by sending an e-mail to the Editorial Office of the journal. The appeal must provide a detailed justification, including point-by-point responses to the Reviewer and Academic Editor comments using an appeal form. Appeals can only be submitted following a reject and decline resubmission decision and should be submitted within three months from the decision date. Failure to meet these criteria will result in the appeal not being considered further. The Editorial Office will forward the manuscript and related information (including the identities of the referees) to a designated Academic Editor. The Academic Editor will be asked to provide
an advisory recommendation regarding the manuscript. This recommendation will then be validated by the Editor-in-Chief. A reject decision at this stage is final and cannot be reversed.

MDPI’s in-house teams perform production on all manuscripts, including language editing, copy editing, and conversion to XML. Language editing is carried out by professional English editing staff. In cases that require more than minor editing or formatting, we offer authors optional editing services for an additional fee (with the authors’ prior approval). The authors are also free to use other English editing services, or consult a native English speaking colleague, with the latter being our preferred option.

MDPI is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), and we follow its Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing. Our journals follow COPE’s procedures for dealing with potentially unethical behavior by authors, reviewers, or editors. All MDPI editorial staff are trained in how to detect and respond to ethical problems.

Details on ethical considerations for submitting papers can be found in the instructions for authors of journals (see here, for example). Please refer to our policy regarding Updating Published Papers.

Ethical issues raised by readers of the journal will be investigated by the Editorial Office following procedures recommended by COPE. Disputes on the validity of research reported in published papers can be settled by the Editorial Board. For disputes around authorship, data ownership, author misconduct, etc., where necessary, we will refer to external organizations such as a university ethics committee. Authors are asked to respond to any substantiated allegations made against them.

To manage authorship disputes, we follow COPE guidelines, particularly How to spot authorship problems. Typically, if all authors agree, the authorship can be updated via a Correction. If not, we require an authoritative statement from the authors' institution(s) about who qualifies for authorship.

MDPI follows the below guidelines and standards for its journals:

ICMJE: Medically-related MDPI journals follow the recommendations of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. The guidelines comprehensively cover all aspects of editing, from how the journal is managed to details about peer review and handling complaints. The majority of the recommendations are not specific to medical journals and are followed by all MDPI journals.

The CONSORT statement covers the reporting of randomized, controlled trials. We encourage authors to verify their work against the checklist and flow diagram and upload it with their submission.

TOP covers the standards of transparency and openness in the reporting of research. Our journals aim to be at level 1 or 2 for all aspects of TOP. Specific requirements vary between journals and can be requested from the Editorial Office.

FAIR Principles cover guidelines to improve the Findability, Accessibility, Interoperability and Reuse of data.

PRISMA covers systematic reviews and meta-analyses. Authors are recommended to complete the checklist and flow diagram and include these with their submission.

ARRIVE contains guidelines for reporting in vivo experiments. Authors are recommended to verify their work against the checklist and include it with their submission.

iThenticate is an industry-standard software for plagiarism detection. It is typically used during the first screening of a manuscript, i.e., during pre-check, but it can also be used at any stage of the peer-review process, particularly before the acceptance of a manuscript, with checking software that automatically identifies issues in scientific images. It is used to screen images in research articles and raw data during the pre-check, manuscript processing, or post-publication review stages.

Compliance with the standards and guidelines above will be taken into account during the final decision, and any discrepancies should be clearly explained by the authors. We recommend that authors highlight relevant guidelines in their cover letter.

All articles published by MDPI are peer-reviewed (except for those of Editorial type) and assessed by our independent Academic Editors, and MDPI staff are not involved in decisions regarding the acceptance of manuscripts. When making a decision, we expect the Academic Editor to make it based solely upon the following:

• The suitability of the selected reviewers;
• The adequacy of the reviewers’ comments and authors’ response;
• The overall scientific quality of the paper.

In all of our journals and in every aspect of our operation, MDPI’s policies are informed by our aim to make scientific research as open and as widely and rapidly accessible as possible.