CPP 2026

Certified Programs and Proofs (CPP) is an international conference on practical and theoretical topics in all areas that consider formal verification and certification as an essential paradigm for their work. CPP spans areas of computer science, mathematics, logic, and education. CPP is sponsored by ACM SIGPLAN, in cooperation with ACM SIGLOG.

CPP 2026 will be held in January 2026 and will be co-located with POPL 2026 in Rennes, France.

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Certified Programs and Proofs (CPP) is an international conference on practical and theoretical topics in all areas that consider formal verification and certification as an essential paradigm for their work. CPP spans areas of computer science, mathematics, logic, and education.

CPP 2026 (https://popl26.sigplan.org/home/CPP-2026) will be held on 12-13 January 2026 and will be co-located with POPL 2026 in Rennes, France. CPP 2026 is sponsored by ACM SIGPLAN, in cooperation with ACM SIGLOG.

CPP 2026 will welcome contributions from all members of the community. The CPP 2026 organizers will strive to enable both in-person and remote participation, in cooperation with the POPL 2026 organizers.

NEWS: CPP IS NOW 100% GOLD OPEN ACCESS

Starting in 2026 all articles published at CPP will be Gold Open Access. Authors should check the Open Access section below for more details on what to expect.

IMPORTANT DATES

• Abstract Submission Deadline: 5 September 2025
• Paper Submission Deadline: 12 September 2025
• Notification: 13 November 2025
• Camera Ready Deadline: 1 December 2025
• Conference: 12-13 January 2026

Deadlines expire at the end of the day, anywhere on earth. Abstract and submission deadlines are strict and there will be no extensions.

AUTHORS TAKE NOTE:

The official publication date is the date the proceedings are made available in the ACM Digital Library. This date may be up to two weeks prior to the first day of your conference. The official publication date affects the deadline for any patent filings related to published work.

DISTINGUISHED PAPER AWARDS

Around 10% of the accepted papers at CPP 2026 will be designated as Distinguished Papers. This award highlights papers that the CPP program committee thinks should be read by a broad audience due to their relevance, originality, significance and clarity.

TOPICS OF INTEREST

We welcome submissions in research areas related to formal certification of programs and proofs. The following is a non-exhaustive list of topics of interest to CPP:

• certified or certifying programming, compilation, linking, OS kernels, runtime systems, security monitors, and hardware;
• certified mathematical libraries and mathematical theorems;
• proof assistants (e.g, ACL2, Agda, Dafny, F*, HOL4, HOL Light, Idris, Isabelle, Lean, Mizar, Nuprl, PVS, Rocq, etc);
• new languages and tools for certified programming;
• program analysis, program verification, and program synthesis;
• program logics, type systems, and semantics for certified code;
• logics for certifying concurrent and distributed systems;
• mechanized metatheory, formalized programming language semantics, and logical frameworks;
• higher-order logics, dependent type theory, proof theory, logical systems, separation logics, and logics for security;
• verification of correctness and security properties;
• certificates for decision procedures, including linear algebra, polynomial systems, SAT, SMT, and unification in algebras of interest;
• certificates for semi-decision procedures, including equality, first-order logic, and higher-order unification;
• certificates for program termination;
• formal models of computation;
• mechanized (un)decidability and computational complexity proofs;
• formally certified methods for induction and coinduction;
• integration of interactive and automated provers;
• logical foundations of proof assistants;
• applications of AI and machine learning to formal verification;
• user interfaces for proof assistants and theorem provers;
• teaching mathematics and computer science with proof assistants.

Submissions will be reviewed based on the following criteria:

• Thoroughly discuss the theory or design choices underpinning the formalization.
• Provide a detailed explanation of the formalization decisions, including alternative approaches (e.g., in other proof assistants) and reasons for rejecting them.
• Examine related literature on formalization choices and techniques.
• Compare the design choices to those made in other libraries.
• Offer feedback on the features of the computer proof assistant used, noting any that are missing.
• Draw conclusions that can guide future formalization efforts in the same or other proof assistants.

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

Prior to the paper submission deadline, the authors should upload their anonymized paper in PDF format through the HotCRP system at

https://cpp2026.hotcrp.com

The submissions must be written in English and provide sufficient detail to allow the program committee to assess the merits of the contribution. They must be formatted following the ACM SIGPLAN Proceedings format using the acmart style with the sigplan option, which provides a two-column style, using 10 point font for the main text, and a header for double blind review submission, i.e.,

\documentclass[sigplan,10pt,anonymous,review]{acmart}\settopmatter{printfolios=true,printccs=false,printacmref=false}

The submitted papers should not exceed 12 pages, including tables and figures, but excluding bibliography and clearly marked appendices. The papers should be self-contained without the appendices. Shorter papers are welcome and will be given equal consideration. Submissions not conforming to the requirements concerning format and maximum length may be rejected without further consideration.

CPP 2026 will employ a lightweight double-blind reviewing process following the process from previous years. To facilitate this, the submissions must adhere to two rules: (1) author names and institutions must be omitted, and (2) references to authors’ own related work should be in the third person (e.g., not “We build on our previous work …” but rather “We build on the work of …”).

The purpose of this process is to help the PC and external reviewers come to an initial judgment about the paper without bias, not to make it impossible for them to discover the authors if they were to try. Nothing should be done in the name of anonymity that weakens the submission or makes the job of reviewing it more difficult. In particular, important background references should not be omitted or anonymized. In addition, authors are free to disseminate their ideas or draft versions of their papers as usual. For example, authors may post drafts of their papers on the web or give talks on their research ideas. Note that POPL 2026 itself will employ full double-blind reviewing, which differs from the light-weight CPP process. This FAQ from previous SIGPLAN conference addresses many common concerns: https://popl20.sigplan.org/track/POPL-2020-Research-Papers#Submission-and-Reviewing-FAQ

We strongly encourage the authors to provide any supplementary material that supports the claims made in the paper, such as proof scripts or experimental data. This material must be uploaded at submission time, as an archive, not via a URL. Two forms of supplementary material may be submitted: (1) Anonymous supplementary material is made available to the reviewers before they submit their first-draft reviews. (2) Non-anonymous supplementary material is made available to the reviewers after they have submitted their first-draft reviews and have learned the identity of the authors.

Please use anonymous supplementary material whenever possible, so that it can be taken into account from the beginning of the reviewing process.

The submitted papers must adhere to the SIGPLAN Republication Policy (https://www.sigplan.org/Resources/Policies/Republication/) and the ACM Policy on Plagiarism (https://www.acm.org/publications/policies/plagiarism). Concurrent submissions to other conferences, journals, workshops with proceedings, or similar forums of publication are not allowed. The PC chairs should be informed of closely related work submitted to a conference or journal in advance of submission. One author of each accepted paper is expected to present it at the (possibly virtual) conference.

OPEN ACCESS

Important update on ACMs new open access publishing model for 2026 ACM Conferences

Starting January 1, 2026, ACM will fully transition to Open Access. All ACM publications, including those from ACM-sponsored conferences, will be 100% Open Access. Authors will have two primary options for publishing Open Access articles with ACM: the ACM Open institutional model or by paying Article Processing Charges (APCs). With over 1,800 institutions already part of ACM Open, the majority of ACM-sponsored conference papers will not require APCs from authors or conferences (currently, around 70-75%).

Authors from institutions not participating in ACM Open will need to pay an APC to publish their papers, unless they qualify for a geographic or discretionary waiver. To find out whether an APC applies to your article, please consult the list of participating institutions in ACM Open and review the APC Waivers and Discounts Policy.

To support a smooth transition and encourage broader ACM Open participation, ACM has introduced a temporary subsidy on APC pricing for 2026, funded directly by ACM. This pricing applies to all articles published in ACM and SIG sponsored conferences taking place in 2026. The subsidized conference pricing for 2026 is as follows:

This represents a 65% discount, funded directly by ACM. Authors are encouraged to help advocate for their institutions to join ACM Open during this transition period.

If any of the authors is affiliated with an institution participating in ACM OPEN (https://libraries.acm.org/acmopen/open-participants), we recommend selecting that author as a “corresponding author”, so that you don’t have to pay an article processing charge (APC). The choice of “corresponding author” (in HotCRP and when submitting the camera-ready version) only impacts whether or not you have to pay an APC, and does not appear on your paper or in the Digital Library. Please use the institutional email address for the “corresponding author” to make it easier for ACM OPEN to kick in automatically.

For timely dissemination of CPP papers we also recommend uploading a preprint online (e.g., on arXiv) and linking it from the paper’s page on the CPP website, since the publishing schedule is very tight for CPP and we cannot guarantee that the proceedings will be ready on time for the conference. The official CPP proceedings from previous years are also available via SIGPLAN OpenTOC (http://www.sigplan.org/OpenTOC/#cpp).

Note, the authors retain copyright and license the work under a Creative Commons license (we recommend CC-BY).

ORGANIZERS

• Kathrin Stark, Heriot-Watt University (conference co-chair)
• Yannick Zakowski, ENS Lyon (conference co-chair)
• Nikhil Swamy, Microsoft Research (PC co-chair)
• Nicolas Tabareau, Inria (PC co-chair)

CONTACT

For any questions please contact the two PC chairs:

• Nikhil Swamy nswamy@microsoft.com
• Nicolas Tabareau nicolas.tabareau@inria.fr

The ACM SIGPLAN International Conference on Certified Programs and Proofs (CPP) covers all areas that consider formal verification and certification as an essential paradigm for their work. CPP spans areas of computer science, mathematics, logic, and education and brings together 100+ researchers and practitioners to present the latest developments in formal verification.

CPP welcomes corporate donations to help maintain and improve the overall experience at the conference. The money we get from corporate sponsors will generally be used to subsidize student attendance (e.g., registration waiving, which generally increases student participation), to pay for live streaming and recording CPP, and facilitate online interaction.

CPP Support Levels

Bronze – Suggested donation $1000

• Company name and logo prominently displayed on the CPP website
• Acknowledgment in the CPP PC chairs’ statement for the proceedings
• Acknowledgment in the CPP chairs’ report talk
• In case of an online/hybrid conference: video room for interacting with conference participants during breaks
• In case of a physical conference: opportunity to display information material on a shared table near the registration desk or the conference room
• One complimentary registration to CPP

Silver – Suggested donation $2500

Bronze benefits plus:

• Acknowledgment as a sponsor of one invited talk
• In case of a physical conference: dedicated table space for interacting with participants for one day of CPP
• One additional complimentary registration to CPP (2 total)

Gold – Suggested donation $5000

Silver benefits plus:

• Acknowledgment as a sponsor of all invited talks
• In case of a physical conference: dedicated table space for interacting with participants for all days of CPP
• One additional complimentary registrations to CPP (3 total)

Diamond (first come first serve, single sponsor) – Suggested donation $10000

Gold benefits plus:

• Sponsor of the CPP dinner (in case of a physical conference)
• An opportunity for a representative from the company to address the attendees for 5 minutes, immediately before or after the chairs’ report (virtual conference) or at the conference dinner (physical conference)
• Potential to accommodate alternative arrangements, in coordination with POPL and subject to ACM guidelines
• One additional complimentary registration to CPP (4 total)

Carbon offset (first come first serve, single sponsor) – Suggested donation $10000

Gold benefits plus:

• A special thanks in the CPP PC chairs’ statement for the proceedings and CPP chairs’ report talk for helping minimize the climate impact of CPP
• Funds in excess of the gold level will be used to purchase carbon offsets

Sponsorship Policy

Sponsors help offset the considerable expense involved in staging the conference, reducing the financial barriers to participation and enhancing inclusivity. We aim to foster a diverse community with participants from varied disciplines, organizations, and geographic locations. We value and encourage participation from across academia, industry, government, and civil society. At the same time, outside contributions can raise concerns about the independence of the conference and the legitimacy the conference may confer on sponsors. We take these concerns seriously and have taken steps to maintain a transparent and appropriate relationship with our sponsors:

• We acknowledge all sources of financial support.
• We disclose all benefits that sponsors receive in exchange for their contribution.
• We ensure that sponsors have no say over the paper selection process, the composition of the program committees, the choice of invited speakers, or the selection of award winners. The substance and structure of the conference are determined independently by the program committee using a rigorous, lightweight double-blind peer review process.
• We only allow sponsors to contribute to a general fund and do not allow sponsors to further specify how their contributions should be spent.
• We are grateful to receive financial support from organizations that respect our twin goals of inclusivity and independence.

Acknowledgment: CPP’s sponsorship policy is adapted from the ACM FAccT conference and used under a CC-BY 2.0 license.

Contact

Questions about how to support CPP may be directed to the conference chairs Kathrin Stark and Yannick Zakowski.

Information about the CPP series at https://www.sigplan.org/Conferences/CPP/