This page shows what a completed NIH Research Performance Progress Report (RPPR) actually looks like, section by section, for a hypothetical Annual RPPR on a standard R01-type award. For the report’s types, required sections, and due dates, see the companion NIH RPPR: Types, Sections, and Deadlines guide — this page assumes that background and focuses only on what goes in each field.
Illustrative example, not a real report. The investigator, institution, project, personnel, publication, and all narrative text below are composite and representative — written to demonstrate the level of detail and format an RPPR entry requires, not drawn from, or attributed to, any specific real award, institution, or investigator. Do not treat any name, figure, or citation on this page as real. Confirm your own award’s exact section requirements and current field labels in eRA Commons before submitting a real RPPR — NIH periodically revises the RPPR Instruction Guide.
The scenario this example is based on
A principal investigator at a US research university is preparing the Annual RPPR for Year 2 of a three-year R01 award. The award is issued under the Streamlined Non-Competing Award Process (SNAP), so Section H (Budget) is not required — SNAP is the standard non-competing continuation process for most NIH research grants; see the types-and-sections guide for when non-SNAP awards must complete Section H instead. The report is drafted by the PI in the RPPR module inside eRA Commons and, once complete, routed to the institution’s Signing Official for submission.
Section A — Cover Page
Section A is populated largely from the Notice of Award and isn’t hand-written: grant number, reporting period start and end dates, PD/PI name, and organization are pulled automatically once the PI opens the correct RPPR instance in eRA Commons. There is nothing to draft here beyond confirming the pre-filled data is correct.
Section B — Accomplishments
What this section asks for: the major goals of the project, what was accomplished against those goals during the reporting period, and a plain-language summary suitable for a non-specialist reviewer.
“The major goals of this project, as stated in the approved Specific Aims, are to (1) characterize the target pathway’s response under baseline and stress conditions, and (2) determine whether pharmacological modulation of that pathway alters the downstream phenotype in the study model. During the current reporting period, we completed baseline characterization across all three planned experimental conditions (Aim 1), generating a dataset consistent with the effect size projected in the approved application. We further completed pilot dosing studies for the modulation experiments (Aim 2) and identified an effective dose range, which we are now using to power the full dose-response study planned for Year 3. One unanticipated finding — a secondary pathway response not described in the original application — is being pursued as a minor exploratory addition and does not require a change to the approved Specific Aims. No significant deviations from the approved timeline occurred during this period.”
Note what this narrative does: it ties every claim back to a specific, numbered Specific Aim from the approved application, states plainly what was and wasn’t finished, and flags a new finding without overstating it as a scope change. NIH program staff read Section B primarily to confirm the project is progressing as proposed — a narrative that can’t be mapped back to the approved aims is the most common reviewer friction point here.
Section C — Products
What this section asks for: publications, datasets, software, and other research outputs generated during the reporting period, with publication compliance status checked against My Bibliography.
Author A, Author B, and Author C (2026). “Illustrative title describing the study’s primary finding.” Journal of Illustrative Research, in press. PMCID: [pending] — pending publication in PubMed Central per the NIH Public Access Policy; compliance status will update automatically once indexing completes.
A real Section C entry is generated from the PI’s My Bibliography library inside eRA Commons rather than typed as free text — the RPPR module pulls the citation and displays the associated Public Access Policy compliance flag (compliant, non-compliant, or in process) directly. If a real manuscript is pending indexing, it still needs to be listed with its compliance status noted, not omitted until the PMCID resolves.
Section D — Participants
What this section asks for: everyone who worked on the project during the reporting period, their role, and their level of effort, plus any change in “other support” since the last report.
| Name | Role | Nearest person month(s) |
|---|---|---|
| [PI name] | Principal Investigator | 1.2 |
| [Postdoctoral associate name] | Postdoctoral Research Associate | 12.0 |
| [Graduate student name] | Graduate Research Assistant | 12.0 |
D.1, listing personnel and effort, is required on every RPPR type, including Interim and Final reports — it’s the one Participants subsection that doesn’t drop off when a report is otherwise abbreviated. The narrative field below the table is where a PI discloses any new or changed other-support items (a new award, a role change on an existing one) since the prior report; if nothing changed, that’s stated explicitly rather than left blank.
Section E — Impact
“Findings from this reporting period contribute methodological infrastructure — a validated baseline characterization protocol for the target pathway — that is already being adapted by one collaborating lab within the institution for a related project outside this award’s scope. No infrastructure, technology transfer, or societal impact beyond the immediate research field is reported for this period.”
Section E is deliberately distinct from Section B: B reports what was done against the approved aims, while E reports the project’s broader influence — on the field, on other disciplines, on research infrastructure, or on society. A short, honest “nothing beyond the immediate field to report” is an acceptable and common Year 2 entry; padding this section with restated Section B content is a frequent reviewer-noted weakness.
Section F — Changes
“No changes to the approved research design, methods, or human subjects/vertebrate animal protocols occurred during this reporting period that require reporting under Section F.”
Section F exists to catch changes that fall short of needing formal prior approval but that NIH still needs on record — for example, a change in a co-investigator’s role, or a modification to inclusion criteria under an already-approved human subjects protocol. If nothing changed, saying so explicitly is the correct entry, not leaving the field blank.
Section G — Special Reporting Requirements
Section G only applies where the award’s Notice of Award or mechanism carries extra reporting terms — most standard R01 awards leave this section not applicable. Where it does apply (for example, additional human-subjects enrollment tables on a clinical trial award, or training-outcome reporting on a T-series award), the specific fields are defined by the award’s own terms rather than by a generic template, so there’s no single illustrative entry that generalizes across mechanisms.
Section H — Budget
Not applicable to this scenario: the award is issued under SNAP, so Section H is skipped entirely. A non-SNAP award would require a categorized budget for the upcoming period here instead — see Budget Justification: A Worked Example for what that category-by-category detail looks like when it is required.
What’s different on an Interim or Final RPPR
The example above is an Annual RPPR — the routine, recurring report filed for a non-competing continuation. Interim and Final RPPRs, filed at or near the end of a competitive segment, differ in three concrete ways worth knowing before drafting one:
- Section D is trimmed. Only D.1 (personnel and effort) is required; the broader Participants narrative content is not.
- Sections F and H drop out. Changes/Problems (F) and Budget (H) are not part of an Interim or Final RPPR.
- Section I is added. Outcomes — a plain-language, public-facing summary of what the project accomplished, published via NIH RePORTER — is required on Interim and Final RPPRs, and is not part of a routine Annual RPPR. A Section I entry reads differently from Section B: it’s written for a lay public audience, not for NIH program staff, and it becomes a permanent public record of the award’s results:
“This project examined how a specific biological pathway responds to stress conditions and whether that response can be modulated to change a related health outcome in the study model. Over the course of the award, the research team established a reliable method for measuring the pathway’s baseline activity, identified a dose range at which modulation produced a measurable change in the outcome of interest, and completed a full dose-response study confirming that effect. These results provide a foundation for future studies examining whether the same modulation approach has therapeutic relevance.”
See the NIH RPPR types and sections guide for the full breakdown of when an Interim RPPR applies versus a Final RPPR, and how Interim RPPR due dates are calculated.
Frequently asked questions
Is there an official NIH RPPR template or fillable form to download?
No. The RPPR is not a downloadable form — it’s completed as a series of online fields directly inside the RPPR module in eRA Commons, section by section, and submitted electronically from there. There is no PDF or Word template that substitutes for completing the module itself, though NIH’s RPPR Instruction Guide (available via era.nih.gov) documents every field in detail.
Can I reuse language from a previous RPPR?
For continuing elements — personnel roles, standing collaborations — yes, reused language is normal and expected. Section B’s progress narrative should not be reused verbatim from a prior period, since it needs to describe what specifically happened during the current reporting period against the approved aims; a narrative that reads identically to last year’s is a common reviewer flag.
Who actually fills in each section — the PI or a research administrator?
The PI (or an authorized delegate) typically drafts the scientific content in Sections B, E, F, and G, since it requires direct knowledge of the research. A department or central research-administration office frequently assembles or reviews Sections A, C, and D, and coordinates routing to the institutional Signing Official, who holds final submission authority. See pre-award vs. post-award office roles for how that division typically works.
What happens if a section is left blank instead of marked “not applicable”?
eRA Commons flags incomplete required sections before allowing submission, but a section that genuinely doesn’t apply (Section G with no special requirements, Section F with no changes) should still be marked explicitly rather than left empty, since a blank field reads as unaddressed rather than as “confirmed not applicable.”
