COLT Submission

Run this audit before uploading a learning-theory paper to COLT. Every number below was checked against the COLT 2026 Call for Papers on 2026-07-08; reopen the current CFP at learningtheory.org before trusting any of it in a later cycle, because COLT republishes its rules from scratch each year.

What the 2026 cycle actually required

• Platform: Microsoft CMT, not OpenReview. The COLT 2026 site pointed authors to https://cmt3.research.microsoft.com/COLT2026. COLT has used other systems in the past, so never assume the portal — follow the link in the live CFP.
• Deadline: February 4, 2026, Anywhere on Earth, for the 39th edition (June 29 to July 3, 2026, San Diego). One deadline for the whole manuscript; the 2026 CFP had no separate abstract-registration step, unlike NeurIPS-style venues. Confirm each year.
• Length: main body at most 12 PMLR-formatted pages excluding references, with no page limit on references and appendices, all submitted as one PDF.
• Anonymity: submissions must be suitable for double-anonymous review; the official LaTeX template's anon option suppresses author names.
• Scope: theoretical aspects of machine learning at the intersection of computer science, statistics, and applied mathematics, explicitly including theory that explains empirical phenomena.

The single-PDF discipline

Because the appendix rides inside the same PDF as the body, COLT has no separate supplement portal to forget — but also no second chance to patch a broken proof file. Treat the appendix as reviewable text, not as an attachment:

• Compile body plus appendix together and check the PDF page count where the 12-page boundary falls; references must start after the body, appendices after references.
• Nothing decision-critical may exist only in the appendix. A reviewer who stops at page 12 should already believe the theorem statements and the proof strategy.
• Anonymize the appendix with the same care as the body: acknowledgements, grant numbers, code URLs pointing at personal repositories, and PDF author metadata all leak.

Illustrative template skeleton

The exact style file name changes with the year (e.g., a colt2026 package for the 2026 cycle). Shape, not filename, is the stable part:

\documentclass[12pt]{article}
\usepackage[anon]{colt2026}   % 'anon' hides authors for review; drop it at camera-ready
\usepackage{times}

\title[Short Title]{Tight Rates for a Learning Problem}
\coltauthor{\Name{Anonymous Author} \Email{anon@example.org}}

\begin{document}
\maketitle
\begin{abstract}%
One-paragraph statement of the problem, the main theorem, and the technique.
\end{abstract}
% <= 12 PMLR-formatted pages of body
% \bibliography{refs}  -- references excluded from the limit
% \appendix            -- full proofs; no page limit, same PDF
\end{document}

Download the real template from the current CFP; do not reuse a prior year's file, and never alter margins, font size, or spacing — layout tampering is a desk-reject risk at any PMLR venue.

Parallel-submission rules (verified for 2026)

The COLT 2026 CFP barred submissions substantially similar to papers previously published, accepted for publication, or in parallel submission to other peer-reviewed conferences with proceedings or to journals. It also barred sending a paper under COLT review to a journal until decisions are released or the paper is withdrawn.

Situation	COLT 2026 reading	Safe action
Same results on arXiv	Preprints are standard in the theory community	Post freely; do not cite your arXiv version in a way that de-anonymizes
Under review at a journal	Forbidden overlap	Withdraw one venue before the COLT deadline
Extended abstract at a proceedings venue (e.g., STOC/FOCS/ALT)	Forbidden if substantially similar	Differentiate results substantially or pick one venue
Non-archival workshop talk	Generally tolerated in theory culture	Verify the workshop is truly non-archival, then declare if the form asks
Journal submission planned after COLT decision	Explicitly allowed once decisions are out	Calendar the journal submission after notification

Desk-reject and severity triage

Trigger	Severity	Window to repair
Body beyond 12 PMLR pages	Desk reject	Only before the deadline
Author names or acknowledgements left in	Desk reject or chair flag	Only before the deadline
Parallel-submission violation	Rejection at any stage, discoverable late	Withdraw the other venue now
Main theorem provable only via a gap-ridden appendix	Review-stage rejection	Fix during the proof-verification pass
Missing formal problem setup in the body	Review-stage damage	Fixable in the writing pass

Final-week sequence for a COLT paper

1. Freeze theorem and lemma statements; every later edit must be proofread against the appendix, because statement-proof drift is the classic COLT correctness kill.
2. Run a full proof-verification pass with a coauthor who did not write the proofs, checking each inequality and each invocation of an external result.
3. Rebuild the single PDF and verify the body/references/appendix boundary pages.
4. Sweep for identity: author macros, \thanks, metadata, repository links, and self-citation phrasing ("in our earlier work [3]" must become third person).
5. Enter CMT early — create the submission record days before February-style AoE cutoffs, since CMT accounts, conflict entry, and subject areas take time on first use.
6. Upload, re-download, and open the PDF that CMT stores; confirm it is the intended compile and the appendix rendered.

CMT logistics worth doing early

• CMT accounts are per-email; make sure every coauthor's CMT identity uses their canonical email, since conflicts and the informed-AC anonymity model key off these records.
• Enter domain conflicts and coauthor conflicts completely — at a small venue an incomplete conflict list risks an actual conflicted reviewer, not a hypothetical.
• Subject-area selections steer reviewer assignment; pick the narrow area that names your subfield over the broad one that flatters the paper.

Cycle-volatility warnings

• Deadline, portal, template name, page count, and anonymity mechanics are re-decided by each year's program chairs. The 2026 facts above are anchors, not permanent rules.
• Whether COLT runs an Open Problems track in a given year, and its separate deadline and non-anonymous format, must be re-checked in the current CFP (待核实 for any cycle after 2026).

Output format

[COLT readiness] Ready / Needs fixes / Not ready
[Blocking checks] <CMT record / 12-page body / single PDF / anonymity / parallel submission>
[Proof-integrity risk] <statement-proof drift, unverified lemma, external-result misuse>
[Desk-reject risk] <one issue>
[Fix order] <ordered actions before the AoE deadline>