Welcome to Electric Literature's submissions hub!
We have a number of categories, including Personal Narrative essays, Recommended Reading, and The Commuter. Please scroll down for information and guidelines on the category you are interested in.
Looking for member submissions? You received an email with the members only submission links when you joined. If you can't find that email or believe you never received it, please email editors@electricliterature.com. Please include the full name associated with your membership so we can confirm your subscription.
For more information on membership and benefits, please reach out to wynter@electricliterature.com.
If you are looking to pitch us a cultural criticism essay, interview, or reading list, please see our guidelines here.
Please note that we do not accept work that was created using generative AI in any category, with rare exception made for pieces that engage with the tool in an intentional, artistic, and transparent manner (e.g., “A conversation between Ethan Gilsdorf and ChatGPT”). Any use of AI in the creation of a piece must be disclosed in your submission.
Emerging Writers Contest — The Emerging Writers contest will be open to fiction and poetry submissions from July 1 to July 15, or until we reach our caps (1,000 for fiction and 600 for poetry).
The contest entry fee is $20. View the complete details, including eligibility information, submission guidelines, and prizes here.
Prose, Poetry, and Graphic Narratives: The Commuter — The Commuter is closed for submissions. Members of Electric Literature can submit year round. Join today!
The Commuter is our home for poetry, flash, graphic, and experimental narratives. It publishes weekly on Wednesday morning, and has showcased the likes of Eshani Surya, Vanessa Chan, Aleksandar Hemon, Weike Wang, Tahirah Alexander Green, and Julia Wertz.
Please keep the following guidelines in mind:
- For Prose, submit one or more pieces, either standalone or connected, in a single document. The total word count should not exceed 1500 words. We encourage writers to push boundaries.
- For Poetry, submit 4–6 poems in a single document, and please limit the page count to 8. Keep in mind that due to our digital platform, not all poems may render exactly as they appear in a PDF.
- For Graphic Narrative, we are interested in both traditional and non-traditional forms of visual storytelling. Submit up to 3 pieces of narrative illustration, comics, mixed media narrative, or genre-negative oddments. For comics, each piece should contain a minimum of 3 panels. The total page count of your submission should not exceed 20 pages.
- Please submit all genres in .doc, .docx, or PDF.
- Please submit only once per category.
- Work previously published in any form cannot be considered.
- Please include your email address.
- If your work is selected, we offer a total payment of $100.
- Writers with a submission pending with Recommended Reading may still submit to The Commuter.
All submissions will be accepted through our Submittable page. For a sense of the kind of work we publish, check out recent issues of The Commuter.
For candid advice from our editors on how to make your poems, flash, graphic, and experimental narratives stand out, watch our video "How to Get Published in The Commuter."
General Fiction: Recommended Reading — Recommended Reading is closed for submissions. Members of Electric Literature can submit year round. Join today!
- Recommended Reading publishes fiction between 2,000 and 10,000 words. (For fiction shorter than 2,000 words, check for open submission periods to The Commuter.)
- Simultaneous submissions are accepted but please notify us immediately if a piece is accepted elsewhere. Work previously published in any form cannot be considered.
- Response time is six to eight months.
- Upon acceptance, we can offer authors $300 for publishing rights.
- During the general submissions periods, writers may submit one piece per period.
- Writers with a submission pending with The Commuter can still submit to Recommended Reading.
- Please do not submit a story already previously rejected by Electric Literature, even if the story has been revised (unless you've been invited to do so by an EL editor).
For candid advice from our editors on how to polish your first pages and revise your work, check out our "Submission Roulette II" event and our video "How to Get Published in Recommended Reading."
Essays: Personal Narrative — Personal Narrative is closed for submissions. Members of Electric Literature can submit year round. Join today!
- Submissions must be full drafts of personal essays submitted via Submittable
- While there are no restrictions on form or subject matter, submissions should center narrative and consider what it means to essay; in other words, write to interrogate, investigate, adventure, and introspect
- Submissions must be between 2,000 and 6,500 words in length
- Simultaneous submissions are accepted, but please let us know immediately if a submission is accepted elsewhere
- Previously published work will not be considered
- Response time is approximately six to eight months
- Writers may submit once per submission period, but writers can have active submissions across other EL categories. (This does not apply to year-round submitting members. For more information on member submissions, please refer to the welcome email you received when you signed up as member, or email wynter@electricliterature.com.)
- Upon acceptance, we can offer authors $100 for publishing rights, with 90-day exclusivity
- For more information on what we’re looking for, please watch our salon on EL’s General Nonfiction Program
Volunteer Reader Applications — We are not currently accepting reader applications. Please check this page for future updates.
We accept applications for volunteer readers to join our editorial team in one of three capacities:
- Recommended Reading, EL’s weekly fiction magazine, publishes one story a week: a mix of original work, forgotten classics, and forthcoming excerpts, each with a personal foreword by today’s best writers. Readers must commit to reading ten stories per week, ranging in length from 2,000 to 8,000 words.
- The Commuter, EL’s weekly magazine of flash fiction, poetry, and graphic narratives, publishes one piece of original work per week, as well as occasional forthcoming excerpts. Readers must commit to reading ten pieces of flash prose or poetry per week.
- EL publishes a selection of original creative nonfiction nearly every day of the week on wide-ranging topics, including but not limited to culture, literature, industry, craft, and personal narrative. Readers must commit to reading ten essays per week, running in length from 2,000 to 5,000 words.
Electric Literature receives a large volume of submissions in all categories, and a committed corps of volunteer readers is essential to helping the editors find new, unknown, and/or overlooked talent. All reader positions are volunteer and require a commitment to complete reading assignments on a weekly basis for approximately six months. Readers will work remotely and on their own schedules (as long as they meet the weekly deadline). Current readers are not allowed to submit their own work for consideration in the category they are reading in.
For 17 years, Electric Literature has remained dedicated to uplifting emerging writers. Now, we’re furthering that mission by launching our very first Emerging Writers Contest, with categories in fiction and poetry!
One winner in each genre will receive $1,000, publication in either Recommended Reading (fiction) or The Commuter (poetry), and two weeks at the Writing Downtown residency program in Downtown Las Vegas, started by Plympton and the Writer’s Block bookstore. Second-place winners will receive $250, and third-place winners will receive $100. All fiction finalists will receive a review with feedback from a literary agent.
2026 Contest Judges
Our 2026 contest judges are Alexander Chee for fiction and Danez Smith for poetry.
Alexander Chee, author of the novels Edinburgh and The Queen of the Night, is an award-winning novelist and essayist whose honors include a Whiting Award and a Guggenheim Fellowship.
Danez Smith, author of Don’t Call Us Dead and Homie, is an award-winning poet and performer widely recognized as one of the leading voices in contemporary poetry.
Eligibility
- This contest is for emerging writers only. We define an emerging writer as anyone who has not published a full-length book with a major publisher. Authors who have published chapbooks, indie or university press books with a print run of under 500, or who have self-published are all eligible, provided the work submitted to the contest is original and unpublished.
- The contest is open to both U.S. and international writers.
- Current or past Electric Literature staff members, interns, or readers in any genre are not eligible to submit.
- Friends, family, and close associates of the guest judges are not eligible to submit to that judge’s contest category.
If you have any questions about your eligibility, please email us at editors@electricliterature.com.
Submission Guidelines
Submissions are open through 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time on July 15, 2026 or until we reach our submission caps: 1,000 for fiction and 600 for poetry. All submissions will be considered for publication.
- Fiction writers may submit one story between 2,000 and 10,000 words. Poets may submit up to three poems, totaling no more than 1,500 words.
- Work will be judged anonymously. Please remove all identifying information from your manuscript.
- All work must be original and unpublished. Work previously published in any form (including self-published) cannot be considered.
- Translations are accepted, provided the work has not previously been published in the English language and that the translator has obtained proper permissions.
- Multiple submissions are allowed. Each entry must be sent as a new submission, and an entry fee must be paid for each.
- Simultaneous submissions are accepted, but please let us know immediately if a submission is accepted elsewhere.
- Files should be submitted as .doc or .docx.
- Work that was created using generative AI is not permitted, with rare exception made for pieces that engage with the tool in an intentional, artistic, and transparent manner (e.g., “A conversation between Ethan Gilsdorf and ChatGPT”). Any use of AI in the creation of a piece must be disclosed in your submission.
Prizes
- Winners in each category will receive $1,000, publication in Recommended Reading (fiction) or The Commuter (poetry), and two weeks at the Writing Downtown residency program in Downtown Las Vegas, started by Plympton and the Writer’s Block bookstore.
- Second-place winners in each category will receive $250, and third-place winners will receive $100.
- All fiction finalists will receive a review with feedback from a literary agent.
- Winners will be announced in early 2027.
Entry Fee
There is a $20 entry fee for each submission. All contest fees go toward supporting Electric Literature, a 501(c)3 nonprofit.
Thank you to our wonderful sponsors: The Shipman Agency, Aevitas Creative Management, and Plympton!
For 17 years, Electric Literature has remained dedicated to uplifting emerging writers. Now, we’re furthering that mission by launching our very first Emerging Writers Contest, with categories in fiction and poetry!
One winner in each genre will receive $1,000, publication in either Recommended Reading (fiction) or The Commuter (poetry), and two weeks at the Writing Downtown residency program in Downtown Las Vegas, started by Plympton and the Writer’s Block bookstore. Second-place winners will receive $250, and third-place winners will receive $100. All fiction finalists will receive a review with feedback from a literary agent.
2026 Contest Judges
Our 2026 contest judges are Alexander Chee for fiction and Danez Smith for poetry.
Alexander Chee, author of the novels Edinburgh and The Queen of the Night, is an award-winning novelist and essayist whose honors include a Whiting Award and a Guggenheim Fellowship.
Danez Smith, author of Don’t Call Us Dead and Homie, is an award-winning poet and performer widely recognized as one of the leading voices in contemporary poetry.
Eligibility
- This contest is for emerging writers only. We define an emerging writer as anyone who has not published a full-length book with a major publisher. Authors who have published chapbooks, indie or university press books with a print run of under 500, or who have self-published are all eligible, provided the work submitted to the contest is original and unpublished.
- The contest is open to both U.S. and international writers.
- Current or past Electric Literature staff members, interns, or readers in any genre are not eligible to submit.
- Friends, family, and close associates of the guest judges are not eligible to submit to that judge’s contest category.
If you have any questions about your eligibility, please email us at editors@electricliterature.com.
Submission Guidelines
Submissions are open through 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time on July 15, 2026 or until we reach our submission caps: 1,000 for fiction and 600 for poetry. All submissions will be considered for publication.
- Fiction writers may submit one story between 2,000 and 10,000 words. Poets may submit up to three poems, totaling no more than 1,500 words.
- Work will be judged anonymously. Please remove all identifying information from your manuscript.
- All work must be original and unpublished. Work previously published in any form (including self-published) cannot be considered.
- Translations are accepted, provided the work has not previously been published in the English language and that the translator has obtained proper permissions.
- Multiple submissions are allowed. Each entry must be sent as a new submission, and an entry fee must be paid for each.
- Simultaneous submissions are accepted, but please let us know immediately if a submission is accepted elsewhere.
- Files should be submitted as .doc or .docx.
- Work that was created using generative AI is not permitted, with rare exception made for pieces that engage with the tool in an intentional, artistic, and transparent manner (e.g., “A conversation between Ethan Gilsdorf and ChatGPT”). Any use of AI in the creation of a piece must be disclosed in your submission.
Prizes
- Winners in each category will receive $1,000, publication in Recommended Reading (fiction) or The Commuter (poetry), and two weeks at the Writing Downtown residency program in Downtown Las Vegas, started by Plympton and the Writer’s Block bookstore.
- Second-place winners in each category will receive $250, and third-place winners will receive $100.
- All fiction finalists will receive a review with feedback from a literary agent.
- Winners will be announced in early 2027.
Entry Fee
There is a $20 entry fee for each submission. All contest fees go toward supporting Electric Literature, a 501(c)3 nonprofit.
Thank you to our wonderful sponsors: The Shipman Agency, Aevitas Creative Management, and Plympton!