FAST '26: Call for Papers

The 24th USENIX Conference on File and Storage Technologies (FAST '26) will take place on February 24–26, 2026, at the Hyatt Regency Santa Clara in Santa Clara, CA, USA.

New for FAST '26: There will be two submission deadlines, and FAST introduces one-shot revisions.

Important Dates

Spring deadline:

• Paper submissions due: Tuesday, March 18, 2025, 23:59 AoE
• Author response period begins: Tuesday, May 20, 2025
• Author response period ends: Thursday, May 22, 2025, 23:59 AoE
• Notification to authors: Thursday, June 5, 2025
• Final paper files due: Tuesday, July 29, 2025, 23:59 AoE

Fall deadline:

• Paper submissions due: Tuesday, September 16, 2025, 23:59 AoE
• Author response period begins: Tuesday, November 18, 2025
• Author response period ends: Thursday, November 20, 2025, 23:59 AoE
• Notification to authors: Monday, December 8, 2025
• Final paper files due: Tuesday, January 27, 2026, 23:59 AoE

Download Call for Papers PDF

Overview

The 24th USENIX Conference on File and Storage Technologies (FAST '26) brings together researchers and practitioners to explore new directions in the design, implementation, evaluation, and deployment of systems related to storage. The program committee interprets storage-related systems broadly: submissions on low-level storage devices, distributed storage systems, information and data management, as well as other systems interconnected with storage are all of interest. The conference will consist of technical presentations including refereed papers and poster sessions.

Topics

The topics of interest to FAST are various aspects of systems related to storage. These include and overlap with, but are not limited to, the following topics:

• Archival systems
• AI for storage and storage for AI
• Auditing and provenance
• Big data, analytics, and data sciences
• Caching, replication, and consistency
• Cloud, multi- and hybrid-cloud environments
• Data deduplication and compression
• Database storage
• Distributed and networked storage (wide-area, grid, peer-to-peer)
• Emerging memory hierarchy design
• Empirical evaluation
• Experience with deployed-systems
• File system design
• Hardware design and prototypes
• HPC systems, including parallel I/O
• Key-value and NoSQL storage
• Memory-only storage systems
• Mobile, personal, embedded, and home storage
• Networking
• Novel and emerging storage technologies (e.g., DNA and glass storage)
• Performance and QoS
• Power-aware storage architectures
• RAID and erasure coding
• Reliability, availability, and disaster tolerance
• Search and data retrieval
• Security
• Storage Management

Submission Instructions

Please submit your short and long papers by one of the submission deadlines listed above, in PDF format via the submission form. Do not email submissions.

The complete submission must be no longer than 12 pages for long papers and no longer than 6 pages for short papers, excluding references.
Supplemental material is optional and may be added (if deemed really necessary) as a single separate PDF file without page limits. However, the reviewers are not required to read or consider such material.

Papers must be typeset on U.S. letter-sized pages in two columns using 10-point Times Roman font on 12-point leading (single-spaced), within a text block 7" wide by 9" deep.

Labels, captions, and other text in figures, graphs, and tables must use font sizes that, when printed, do not require magnification to be legible. References must not be set in a smaller font. Submissions that violate these requirements will not be reviewed. Limits will be enforced strictly. No extensions will be given for reformatting.

A LaTeX template and style file are available on the USENIX templates page.

Double-blind policy: Authors must not be identified in the submissions, either explicitly or by implication. To refer to your previous work, consider it as written by a third party. Do not say "reference removed for blind review." Supplemental material must be anonymized. Submissions violating anonymization rules will not be considered for review.

Prior Workshop Paper Policy: If a submission extends a prior workshop paper, please include an anonymized copy of the workshop paper as supplemental material. This should be the same as the published version, with any identifying information removed.

Simultaneous submission of the same work to multiple venues, submission of previously published work, or plagiarism constitutes dishonesty or fraud. USENIX, like other scientific and technical conferences and journals, prohibits these practices and may take action against authors who have committed them. See the USENIX Conference Submissions Policy for details.

Papers accompanied by nondisclosure agreement forms will not be considered.

Submissions should abide by the Conflict Identification guidelines.

Short Papers

FAST also solicits short papers (up to 6 pages long). For short papers, the title should be prefixed with "Short Paper: ", followed by the title. The prefix will not be published in the proceedings and short papers will not be called out as such in the program. Authors must also indicate that they are submitting a short paper by checking the appropriate checkbox on the submission form. The program committee will not accept a paper on the condition of adjusting its length beyond typical shepherding guidelines. Submissions will be considered only in the category in which they are submitted.

Deployed-Systems Papers

FAST also solicits papers that describe real operational systems, including systems currently in production. For deployed-systems papers, the title should be prefixed with "Deployed System: ", followed by the title. The prefix will not be published in the proceedings. Authors must also indicate that they are submitting a deployed-systems paper by checking the appropriate checkbox on the submission form.

Double-blind policy for deployed-systems papers: All submissions for FAST '26 are required to follow the double-blind policy.

Author Response Period

FAST '26 will allow authors to respond to reviews prior to final decision. Responses are optional and limited to 1000 words.

Conflict Identification

Upon submitting your paper, authors must indicate conflicts with PC members.

One-Shot Revision

For the first time at FAST '26, a few papers that cannot be accepted immediately but which are likely to be accepted with a revision will be given the opportunity to submit a one-shot revision.

Policy on FAST Resubmissions

Papers rejected at the spring deadline cannot be resubmitted at the FAST '26 fall deadline. However, both papers rejected at the spring and fall deadlines may be resubmitted at either deadline for FAST '27.

SUBMIT YOUR WORK