The International Symposium on Empirical Software Engineering and Measurement (ESEM) technical papers (main) track features submissions that describe original, unpublished work in software engineering and software measurement, with a strong empirical foundation. Papers in this track should communicate fully developed research and results. Strong emphasis should be given to the methodological aspects of the research and the assessment of the validity of the contributions.

Please note:

Open Science policy: ESEM is open by default. Submissions must comply with the Open Science Policy and provide the artifacts needed to understand and reproduce the analysis, unless legal/ethical barriers exist (see details on Data Availability below).
Double-anonymous review format: ESEM 2026 uses double blind reviewing. Submissions must not reveal authors’ identities.

General scope of submissions

Submissions must not be under consideration for publication or presentation elsewhere. In addition to the specific scope of this track, submissions may address any aspect of software engineering but must tackle the problem from an empirical perspective and using a rigorous empirical method, including (but not limited to):

Empirical studies using qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods
Cross- and multi-disciplinary methods and studies
Controlled experiments and quasi-experiments
Case studies, action research, ethnography, and field studies
Survey research
Simulation studies
Artifact studies
Data mining using statistical, machine learning, and AI-based approaches
Meta-studies and evidence syntheses, including:
Systematic literature reviews and rapid reviews with a strong synthesis component and a clear contribution beyond overview summarization
Meta-analyses, and qualitative, quantitative, or structured syntheses of prior studies that generate clear new insights
Replication studies

Papers should be positioned in terms of research methodology and contribution in relation to established frameworks for empirical software engineering and measurement.

Negative results are also welcome as long as the research is based on well-motivated hypotheses in line with the state-of-the-art, relevant scientific knowledge that is then well-documented, analysed in depth, and provides clear value to the community.

Topics of interest (illustrative, not exhaustive)

Topics in scope for ESEM 2026 and commonly addressed using an empirical approach include, but are not limited to:

Evaluation and comparison of software models, tools, techniques, and practices
Modeling, measuring, and assessing product or process quality and productivity
Continuous software engineering
Software verification and validation, including analysis and testing
Engineering of software systems that include machine learning components and data dependencies
Applications of software engineering to different types of systems and domains (e.g., IoT, cyber-physical systems, Industry 4.0)
Human factors, teamwork, and behavioral aspects of software engineering

We also welcome submissions that relate to meta-topics around empirical software engineering research, including for example:

Development, evaluation, and comparison of empirical approaches and methods
Infrastructure, techniques, and tools for conducting and supporting empirical studies