What CORE Rankings Actually Mean (and How to Use Them)
If you’re a researcher deciding where to submit, where to attend, or how to explain your CV to a hiring committee, you’ve probably encountered the CORE ranking system. A*, A, B, C — but what do they actually mean, and how much weight should you put on them?
What is CORE?
CORE (Computing Research and Education Association of Australasia) maintains a ranked list of computer science conference venues updated roughly every two to three years. The rankings are widely used in Australia, New Zealand, and increasingly across European and Asian institutions as a reference for evaluating research output.
The ranking process involves community nomination, bibliometric analysis, and expert review by the CORE executive. It isn’t perfect, and it isn’t universally accepted — but it is one of the few systematic attempts to categorize the quality of CS conference venues at scale.
What the tiers mean
A* — World Top
A* conferences are considered the flagship venues in their field. Acceptance rates are typically low (15-25%), program committees are drawn from the top researchers globally, and acceptance at an A* venue carries significant weight in hiring and promotion decisions at research-intensive institutions. Examples: NeurIPS, ICSE, CVPR, CCS, CHI.
A — Excellent
A-ranked conferences are high-quality venues that fall just below the top tier. They are selective, well-regarded within their communities, and typically accepted as strong publications for tenure review purposes. For many subfields, an A conference is the realistic target for most researchers — and in some tightly-defined areas, the A venues are as respected as any A*. Examples: EuroSys, AISTATS.
B — Good
B-ranked conferences are solid venues — peer-reviewed, with reasonable selectivity — but typically carry less weight than A or A* at research-intensive institutions. They can be a reasonable choice for work-in-progress, for reaching a specific practitioner audience, or early in a research career. Some B venues are also genuinely well-attended and influential within niche subfields despite their ranking.
C — Other
C-ranked venues are lower in the hierarchy. They are legitimate peer-reviewed conferences but are generally not considered strong publication venues for CV purposes at research universities. Some C conferences have very broad scope or lower selectivity.
Unranked
Many conferences — especially industry events, newer venues, and interdisciplinary workshops — are simply not in the CORE list. Unranked doesn’t mean low-quality; it often means the conference hasn’t been nominated or doesn’t fit the CS-centric scope of the ranking system.
Limitations worth knowing
CORE is CS-specific. The rankings cover computer science and closely related fields. Interdisciplinary venues that aren’t primarily CS (even if they frequently publish CS work) may be unranked or ranked inconsistently.
Rankings are slow to update. A conference that has grown in prestige, or declined, in the past five years may not reflect that in its current CORE tier. Some of the most important AI/ML venues have changed significantly in scope and selectivity faster than CORE cycles can track.
Field variation matters. An A ranking in systems or security may be equivalent in prestige to an A* in a smaller subfield. Community norms vary — in some areas, workshops at top conferences are where the real work gets presented first.
It’s a guide, not a mandate. Hiring committees and tenure processes differ widely. Some institutions care deeply about CORE tier; others weight citation impact, journal publications, or community engagement more heavily. Check what your specific institution and department actually use.
How to use CORE rankings practically
When deciding where to submit: A* and A venues should be your first consideration if you have strong work and a realistic chance of acceptance. Don’t submit to a B venue just to get published — a rejection from an A* tells you more about how to improve the work.
When evaluating a conference you haven’t heard of: CORE is a useful sanity check on unfamiliar venues. If you’re invited to submit to a conference with a vague name and aggressive timelines, a quick CORE check (and a look at past proceedings) tells you a lot.
When explaining your CV: If you’re at an institution that uses CORE, lead with A* publications and make clear which conferences carry that designation. If your audience doesn’t use CORE (common in North America and industry), citation counts and community reputation matter more.
When building a conference travel plan: For most researchers, A* and A conferences are where you want to be seen, meet collaborators, and stay current with the field. The flagship conferences by CORE tier are also typically the largest, best-attended, and most likely to have workshops, tutorials, and social events worth your time.
Where to look up rankings
The official CORE portal is at core.edu.au/conference-portal. You can search by acronym, name, or field.
WorkWander shows the CORE ranking on every conference page where the rank is known — look for it in the conference header and the Overview tab. You can also filter by research area across the full conference calendar to find A* and A venues in your field.
Rankings are one input among many. The best conferences to attend are the ones where your community actually gathers — and sometimes those align perfectly with the CORE tier, and sometimes they don’t. Use the rankings as a starting point, not a final word.