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Curiosity and the Cat (Our Obsession with Statistics)

That's one cool cat.

We Duotroopers are a curious bunch, and we like keeping all sorts of statistics on the publishers and agents we have listed. When we created Duotrope, we realized that there weren't any resources for keeping track of what really happens to submissions at any given publication or agency.

  • An editor might say they have a 30-day response time, but do they really?
  • What are the chances of being accepted by one of the top journals or agents?
  • What publications are beginner-friendly?

We set out to answer those questions and many others, and we're proud to say that we're the only resource that offers the vast amounts of data and accurate statistics that we have.

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Currently we offer a few different pages, each with an assortment of reports and data:

Submission and Response Statistics for Publications

Some things you can learn from all that (for example):

  • Someone who is new to submitting might target the 25 publishers with the highest percentage of acceptances or the 25 publishers or agents that are fastest to respond.
  • A frustrated writer might see the overall acceptance/rejection ratios and remind him/herself that the road to publication takes patience and perseverance above all.
  • An editor might be shocked to see his/her/their publication at the top of the list of the 25 publications with the slowest response times and vow to make amends.
  • If you're looking for some lesser known publications and agents, you might discover some on the lists of publishers or agents with no submission reports.

Submission and Response Statistics for Literary Agents

Many of the same reports that we have for publishers are also available for Literary Agents. See our statistical reports on literary agent submissions.

Fee Status Report

There's been a lot of discussion lately about submission fees in the literary world, so we created some reports to shed much needed light on the trend.

  • How many journals and contests charge fees now?
  • Are acceptance rates higher with or without fees?

Search Stats

  • A summary of what our members want most in publishers or agents
  • The percentage of member searches run this month for any given Genre, Theme, Length, Payscale, Media, Submission Type, or Country

Something you can learn from that (for example):

  • If you're an editor, you might learn that the vast, vast majority of writers are looking for print publications that accept electronic submissions, and that they want to be paid. (We're not making that up, but don't take our word for it. Check for yourself.)

Other Publisher Stats

  • The publishers with the most response times reported to us in the past 12 months
  • The publications with the highest number of submitters reported to us in the past 12 months
  • The publishers that have been "favorited" by the most active members

Other Agent Stats

  • The agents with the most response times reported to us in the past 12 months
  • The agents with the highest number of submitters reported to us in the past 12 months
  • The agents that have been "favorited" by the most active members

These lists are not indicative of popularity or quality (neither does absence from the lists imply lack of quality or popularity). They are only provided to pique people's curiosity and to encourage people to report their response times to us.

Stats on our Stats

We are strong believers in transparency. That's why we provide so many statistics on publishers. We're also willing to shine that light on ourselves. Our "State of the Stats" provides the numbers of submissions reported, new listings added, contacts received, and listing updates over the past several years.


Curious about anything else? Let us know.