PRISMA 2020: A Practical Reporting Guide for Systematic Reviews

Start with the right reporting documents

PRISMA 2020 provides a 27-item checklist with sub-items, an expanded checklist, an abstract checklist and flow diagrams. The statement was published in 2021; “2020” is the guideline's name. The statement and explanation paper should be read together.

Download the official checklist and fill its location column with manuscript pages or supplement references. When an item needs interpretation, consult the expanded checklist. Explain why an item does not apply instead of inventing a method or result to fill the box. You can also fill in the checklist online with our fillable PRISMA 2020 checklist and download it as a Word file.

For a scoping review, consult the PRISMA-ScR extension. The scoping-review diagram guide explains its selection terminology. For questions about a purported later release, see our correction on PRISMA reporting in 2026.

Report the search so another reader can follow it

Items 6 and 7 address information sources and search strategies. Identify the sources searched and their search dates, and provide the full strategies for the databases, registers and websites, including limits and filters. Those details belong in a supplement when they cannot fit in the main text. See the official checklist.

A useful working record has the source name, platform, executed strategy, date and returned count together. If you rerun a search, keep that run distinguishable from the earlier one. This makes it easier to explain what the figure includes and to avoid adding the same records twice.

Describe decisions made by people and software

The checklist already includes automation where applicable: item 8 concerns selection, item 9 data collection and item 11 risk-of-bias assessment. Report the reviewer process and what the tool actually did. The expanded guidance explains the additional information relevant to automation.

Distinguish software used to store decisions from software used to prioritise records, remove records or make classifications. Explain human checks and disagreement resolution. A tool's name alone does not reveal its role; describe its use in the review you performed.

Reconcile the selection figure with the evidence table

Selection-results item 16a concerns the path from identified records to included studies; item 16b concerns apparently eligible studies that were excluded and why. The four official diagram templates let you choose a new or updated review and whether other sources were used.

A record is a search entry, a report is a document, and a study is an investigation. For example, 30 reports may describe 24 studies. Link reports to studies in your working records before deciding the final study total. A report you could not retrieve belongs in the unavailable-report count; it was not assessed and excluded on eligibility grounds.

The PRISMA flow diagram generator and checker highlights arithmetic discrepancies and keeps these units separate. The worked examples show the count trail, while the template page links the original editable Word files. A count check cannot verify the identity of evidence or the correctness of an exclusion decision.

Make the synthesis and its limitations understandable

The methods and results need to tell a consistent story. The checklist separates synthesis methods and results, risk of bias in studies, missing-result bias and certainty of evidence. Consult the relevant items in the official checklist rather than treating them as one interchangeable “quality” statement.

As an author check, pick one result and trace it back to the eligible studies, extracted data and stated method. If a planned analysis changed, make the change and its reason findable. If you did not perform a meta-analysis, describe the synthesis you actually used. Discuss limitations of both the evidence and the review process.

Finish the abstract and supporting information

Use the separate PRISMA 2020 for Abstracts checklist to audit the abstract itself. It updates the earlier 2013 abstract statement. Its 12 items include funding and registration; a statement about competing interests in the main manuscript does not replace those items.

In the main checklist, item 24 addresses registration, the protocol and amendments. Items 25–27 cover support, competing interests and the availability of data, code and other materials. Report the actual status, including when a review was not registered or a protocol was not prepared. The checklist asks for transparent reporting; it cannot change what happened earlier in the project.

Before submitting, follow each checklist reference to its destination, compare the abstract and main text with the final evidence table, and check that the diagram uses the same version of the screening log. Then read the target journal's current instructions for required attachments and figure formats.