Duotrope's Submission Fees Report

Are submission fees worth it, or should you save your money?

There's been a lot of discussion lately about the state of submission fees in the literary world. We hope these figures shine some light on the situation. You can use the reports below to see the overall fee ratios, along with the average acceptance ratios by category, and compare "literary" versus "genre" publications.

All Active Publication Listings

Criteria: All active listings

Fees?	Count	Avg Acceptance%
Never Fees	4,228 (69.22%)	8.00%
Optional Fees	277 (4.54%)	8.40%
Some Fees	191 (3.13%)	2.65%
Always Fees	1,412 (23.12%)	3.37%
Total	6,108	6.33%

Average fee paid: USD $7.06

Literary Contests

Criteria: Active listings with Type: Contest, Style: Literary, Genre: General

Fees?	Count	Avg Acceptance%
Never Fees	131 (12.61%)	3.97%
Optional Fees	9 (0.87%)	n/a
Some Fees	18 (1.73%)	3.93%
Always Fees	881 (84.79%)	2.39%
Total	1,039	2.51%

Average fee paid: USD $20.27

Literary Journals

Criteria: Active listings with Type: Journal, Style: Literary, Genre: General

Fees?	Count	Avg Acceptance%
Never Fees	1,885 (74.24%)	7.79%
Optional Fees	203 (8.00%)	7.92%
Some Fees	152 (5.99%)	2.68%
Always Fees	299 (11.78%)	3.67%
Total	2,539	6.24%

Average fee paid: USD $3.89

Genre Contests

Criteria: Active listings with Type: Contest, Style: Any, Genre: Any except General

Fees?	Count	Avg Acceptance%
Never Fees	34 (30.36%)	4.87%
Optional Fees	2 (1.79%)	n/a
Some Fees	1 (0.89%)	n/a
Always Fees	75 (66.96%)	6.60%
Total	112	6.65%

Average fee paid: USD $19.23

Genre Journals

Criteria: Active listings with Type: Journal, Style: Any, Genre: Any except General

Fees?	Count	Avg Acceptance%
Never Fees	498 (83.00%)	8.18%
Optional Fees	52 (8.67%)	10.00%
Some Fees	15 (2.50%)	2.83%
Always Fees	35 (5.83%)	5.12%
Total	600	7.91%

Average fee paid: USD $4.43

Note: These statistics are compiled once a day and based on submissions reports for the past 12 months. Last compiled: 27 April 2025 7:25 PM UTC (16 hours, 4 minutes ago).

If you have any suggestions on how we can improve this report, please let us know.