NIH Wants To Score Grant Applications As 'Most Competitive,' 'Competitive,' Or 'Not Discussed'

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) opened a 60-day public comment window on Aug. 14, 2026, on a proposal to replace the final overall impact score and percentile rank that grant applicants receive with three named categories: "most competitive," "competitive," and "not discussed" (NOT-OD-26-088). Comments close Oct. 13, 2026.

Current NIH peer review is a two-stage process: reviewers produce written critiques and preliminary scores, top applications are discussed, and voting members' final overall impact scores are averaged into a single score that appears in the summary statement applicants see. A second stage, in which program staff weigh those reviews against agency priorities, funding availability, and portfolio balance before recommending awards, is unchanged in concept. The RFI narrows only the first-stage output (Mondaq analysis).

NIH's rationale is to reduce reliance on numerical rankings and give program officials more flexibility to weigh peer review alongside agency priorities, scientific opportunities, and workforce needs. The RFI itself flags three tradeoffs: reduced transparency and benchmarking for applicants, expanded NIH discretion, and the perception that outcomes reflect programmatic or policy priorities more than peer review alone.

The "most competitive" tier is described in summary coverage as the top quarter of final scores, a figure at the edge of the visible excerpt that has not been verified against the full notice. The proposal is non-binding; NIH can move from RFI to implementation without further notice once the window closes.