Peer review makes research software better. Join us.

Open, community-led review that sets the standard for scientific Python software.

A pyOpenSci community member smiling while working on a sticker-covered laptop during PyCon US sprints.

About peer review

pyOpenSci runs an open, community-led peer review process for scientific Python packages. Volunteer editors and reviewers ensure software is well-documented, tested, and maintained — making it easier for scientists everywhere to trust and use.

Learn how to submit a package for review

66 packages accepted

127 reviewers

123 maintainers

Step 1

Author submits

Package authors open a submission issue in our GitHub repo.

Step 2

Editor assigns reviewers

An editor finds two reviewers with relevant domain and Python expertise.

Step 3

Review & acceptance

Reviewers give structured feedback. Authors iterate. Editor makes the call.

See a review in progress All reviews are public on GitHub making the entire process transparent and open to everyone.

Review 1–2 packages per year. No prior review experience needed — we’ll walk you through it.

Editors manage the review process end-to-end and help shape pyOpenSci’s standards.

Learn about the role

Meet our editorial board

The pyOpenSci software peer review process is led by a volunteer team of editors from the scientific Python community. Editors do the following things:

They find reviewers from diverse backgrounds who have a mixture of scientific domain and Python experience.
They oversee the entire review process for a package ensuring it runs in a timely and efficient manner.
They support the submitting authors and reviewers in answering questions related to the review.
They determine whether that package should be accepted into the pyOpenSci ecosystem once the review has wrapped up.

Learn more about the editor role at pyOpenSci in our peer review guide.