NIH RPPR: 4 Types, Sections & Due Dates

The Research Performance Progress Report (RPPR) is the standardized report NIH and other Public Health Service agencies use to track a grant’s scientific progress, personnel, outputs, and compliance status after an award is made. It is submitted electronically through the RPPR module in eRA Commons, with no paper or email-based alternative.

It replaced NIH’s older Progress Report / PHS 2590 non-competing continuation format for most award types, and it is now the required vehicle for every type of progress reporting NIH does: annual continuation, project closeout, and interim reporting ahead of a competing renewal.

This page covers the RPPR itself: its report types, its required sections, who submits it and how, and its due dates. It is distinct from the grant management systems that institutions use to track reporting deadlines, and from the general post-award administrative role that prepares it. For the RPPR’s place among a recipient’s other federal grant reporting requirements — financial, invention, and closeout reports among them — see CASRAI’s overview guide.

What the RPPR is for

Every NIH grant that continues beyond its first budget period, or that reaches the end of its funded project period, generates an RPPR obligation. The report serves NIH’s program and grants management staff as the primary evidence that a project is progressing as proposed, that personnel and effort commitments match what was awarded, and that any required compliance items (human subjects, vertebrate animals, data sharing, public access to publications) are being met. NIH will generally not release funding for a grant’s next budget period until a satisfactory RPPR has been submitted and accepted — so, functionally, the RPPR is also the mechanism that triggers continued funding, not just a retrospective compliance document.

The RPPR types: Annual, Final, Interim, and MYF

NIH defines four RPPR types, and which one applies depends on where the award sits in its lifecycle:

Annual RPPR — the standard non-competing continuation report, submitted once per budget period for most multi-year awards. It describes scientific progress during the just-completed period and plans for the next one, and it is the document NIH reviews before issuing the next year’s Notice of Award.
Final RPPR — submitted at the true end of a project period (the competitive segment ends and the PI is not renewing, or the renewal application was unsuccessful). It is one of the three documents required for grant closeout, alongside the Final Federal Financial Report (FFR) and, where applicable, the Final Invention Statement and Certification.
Interim RPPR — used when a PI has submitted a competing renewal (Type 2) application before the current project period ends, but the funding decision on that renewal has not yet been made by the time the current segment expires. It covers the same content as a Final RPPR for the segment that’s ending, but the award itself isn’t necessarily closing — if the renewal is funded, the Interim RPPR is effectively superseded by continued reporting under the new segment.
Multi-Year Funded (MYF) RPPR — applies to the small set of mechanisms NIH funds in a single lump-sum “multi-year” award rather than year-by-year (e.g., most F-series fellowships). Because there’s no annual continuation decision to support, the MYF RPPR is a lighter, annual check-in tied to the award’s anniversary date rather than a funding-release gate.

Where and how it’s submitted: the eRA Commons RPPR module

All four RPPR types are prepared and submitted through the RPPR module inside eRA Commons, NIH’s electronic research administration system — the same system used for proposal submission via ASSIST and post-award actions like prior-approval requests. A Program Director/Principal Investigator (PD/PI) — or a delegate the PI authorizes for RPPR preparation — initiates and drafts the report inside Commons. Once drafted, only an institutional Signing Official (SO) can submit it to NIH; the PI role in Commons does not have submission authority on its own. This PI-drafts, SO-submits split mirrors the routing convention used for proposal submission and is a common point of institutional deadline slippage if the SO review step isn’t built into the internal timeline with enough lead time.

The RPPR sections

Every RPPR is organized into lettered sections; which ones apply depends on the report type and award terms:

A — Cover Page: award identifiers, reporting period, and administrative data pulled largely from the Notice of Award.
B — Accomplishments: the scientific narrative — major goals, specific objectives, and significant results for the reporting period, plus a plain-language description of what was accomplished relative to the approved specific aims.
C — Products: publications, datasets, software, patents, and other research outputs generated during the period, including publication compliance status under the NIH Public Access Policy — the RPPR module checks listed publications against My Bibliography compliance status directly.
D — Participants: personnel who worked on the project during the period, their roles, and (for most mechanisms) their effort, plus any changes in other support.
E — Impact: the project’s actual or anticipated influence on its field, other disciplines, infrastructure, and (where relevant) society, distinct from the progress narrative in Section B.
F — Changes: any changes to the approved research design, methods, or human subjects/animal welfare status that require reporting even if they didn’t require prior approval.
G — Special Reporting Requirements: award-specific or mechanism-specific items — for example, additional reporting some cooperative agreements or training grants carry.
H — Budget: required only for non-SNAP (Streamlined Non-Competing Award Process) awards, which need a categorized budget for the upcoming period; SNAP awards skip this section entirely, which is one of the practical differences between the two award types.
I — Outcomes: a lay-audience summary of the project’s outcomes, required only on Final and Interim RPPRs, since it becomes the public-facing closeout record of what the funded project produced.

Due dates: SNAP, non-SNAP, MYF, and Interim/Final

RPPR due dates are calculated differently depending on award type, and getting this wrong is one of the more common institutional compliance failures:

SNAP awards: due on the 15th of the month before the month in which the current budget period ends — roughly 45 days before the next budget period would start.
Non-SNAP awards: due on the 1st of the month before the month in which the current budget period ends — roughly 60 days out, reflecting the extra time NIH program staff need to review the Section H budget that SNAP awards don’t require.
MYF awards: due annually on or before the anniversary of the award’s budget/project period start date.
Interim and Final RPPRs: due 120 days after the period of performance end date for the competitive segment — a longer window than the annual cycle, reflecting that closeout-adjacent reporting typically requires gathering final publication and outcomes data that isn’t necessarily ready the day the segment ends.

These deadlines are fixed by the award terms, not negotiable case-by-case, and a late or missing RPPR is the most common reason a grant’s next-year funding is held pending resolution.

RPPR vs. the Federal Financial Report (FFR)

The RPPR and the Federal Financial Report are separate, non-substitutable documents that are easy to conflate because they’re due around the same points in an award’s lifecycle. The RPPR reports scientific and programmatic progress; the FFR (submitted through the Payment Management System, not eRA Commons) reports the award’s financial status — expenditures against the approved budget. Both are required for closeout, but neither one satisfies the other’s requirement, and they’re prepared and submitted through different systems by different institutional offices in most sponsored-programs structures (the PI’s lab/department typically owns the RPPR narrative; central post-award finance typically owns the FFR). See grant management systems for how institutions typically track both deadlines against a single award timeline.

Frequently asked questions

Is the RPPR the same for all NIH award types?

The core module and A–G sections are consistent across mechanisms, but which optional sections apply (H, I) and how much detail Section G expects varies by award type and specific NIH Institute or Center instructions. Training and fellowship mechanisms in particular carry additional Section G requirements tied to trainee outcomes.

What happens if an RPPR is submitted late?

NIH will generally not issue the Notice of Award for the next budget period until a satisfactory RPPR has been reviewed and accepted, so a late submission directly delays continued funding rather than triggering a separate penalty process.

Can a PI submit the RPPR themselves?

A PI (or an authorized delegate) can draft and complete every section in eRA Commons, but final submission to NIH requires an institutional Signing Official’s action — the PI role does not have submission authority on its own.

Does every RPPR require a budget section?

No. Section H (Budget) is required only for non-SNAP awards. Most standard research grants are issued under SNAP and skip Section H entirely.

How is an Interim RPPR different from a Final RPPR?

Both cover the same type of content for an ending competitive segment, but a Final RPPR means the project is genuinely closing out, while an Interim RPPR is filed when a competing renewal application is already pending — if that renewal is funded, reporting continues under the new segment rather than the award closing.