How to Pitch Stories to WIRED

BACK IN 1993, WIRED's founders published a manifesto offering some guidance. "Our first instruction to our writers: Amaze us … tell us something we've never heard before, in a way we've never seen before. If it challenges our assumptions, so much the better."

All these years later, that still sounds pretty good to us, if incomplete. We want to encourage a broad set of writers to amaze and challenge us. So here's a more transparent look at how we assess and assign stories.

WIRED is a publication about change—about the ways science and technology are reshaping the world and what it means to be human. While the subjects of WIRED stories run the gamut from deep dives into the biggest tech companies to Hindu extremism to digital blackface to space food to true crime, every story has technology, science, or innovation as one of its key variables.

The science fiction author William Gibson once said that the future is already here, it's just unevenly distributed. WIRED stories are often about those places where the future seems to be welling up in the present. We are always on the hunt for faint signals of change that have the potential to become strong signals later.

There are two main areas where we assign stories to contributors from outside our staff: features and essays (for our Ideas section). We also assign a smaller number of freelance stories for our business, science, and service sections.

The Ideas section takes pitches from journalists, academics, and other subject-matter experts for reported, argument-driven essays on any WIRED-related topic. (To submit an op-ed, please see these guidelines.) Finished pieces tend to be in the range of 1,200 to 1,800 words. It’s helpful—but not strictly necessary—to include a line or two at the top of a pitch explaining how your idea relates to current news or trends in technology or science. Ideas pieces are not news articles: We’re more interested in your thoughts and arguments than quoted experts. Here are a few examples from the section. See additional guidelines for pitching the Ideas section here. 

Send your pitches to editors Angela Chen and Ricki Harris at ideas@wired.com.

The vast majority of the features we publish are narratives. Which is to say, for best results pitch us a tale you’re going to tell, not a topic you want to explore. What central chronology are you going to reconstruct? Who are your main characters? What scenes are we going to be able to see? You don’t have to know the full narrative arc of your story when you pitch, but you should be able to give some indication that it’s going to be a satisfying one. Also, be able to convey your tale’s larger implication or importance.

WIRED does occasionally publish feature-length essays, but there, too, we’re looking for a focused through line, not just an exploration of a topic. What argument are you making, and what evidence will you muster for it? Or: What’s the core example (or two, or three) that will animate the idea you’re hoping to get across?

For any feature pitch, give us a sentence or two about the sort of work you’ve done, and please include links to other stories, especially long-form narrative pieces.

A pitch needs to have enough detail to intrigue us, but not TMI. For a feature, 500 to 700 words is a good range. For Ideas, 200 to 300.

We are glad you asked! We have just made a change in the way we think about our stories and we are excited to talk about it. In the past, we assigned, edited, and created art specifically for the print issue of WIRED. The issue would ship off to the printers and, voila!, three weeks later it would appear in mailboxes and on newsstands, and at the same time the articles would start to appear on WIRED’s website.

But this method started to feel backwards to us. Often, we have timely stories that we want to let loose into the world before our print deadlines permit. Or we would have a great online-only feature that couldn’t get into the print magazine. So in January, we started publishing all our longform features online first. We then pick some of those articles to run in an upcoming print issue. The print issue comes out 10 times a year, which means about 40 to 50 of all our feature stories will appear in print a year.

In the past, fees for print pieces were much higher than those for web pieces. But this distinction started to feel archaic, a byproduct of an earlier era. Rather than think about our longform stories as “print” or “web” when setting rates, we will now consider other factors: How much reporting does the story require? How much time will it take to report the piece? Is it a newsy feature that comes together quickly? Some feature stories take months to develop and require intensive fact-checking and editing resources; those stories will get higher fees.

Under our new system, we will offer set project fees depending on the factors described above—story length, time involved, and intensity of the reporting and writing involved. These story fees now start at about $2,500 and rise from there. Other short, online-only content starts at $500 and rises with time commitment and reporting intensity.

If you want to pitch a feature story, here are the editors along with a few of the stories they’ve worked on.

1. Camille Bromley, features editor.
2. Jon Eilenberg, articles editor. Stories here, here, here, and here.
3. John Gravois, senior editor. Stories here, here, here, and here.
4. Caitlin Kelly, features editor.
5. Michelle Legro, deputy features editor.
6. Anthony Lydgate, senior editor. Stories here, here, here, and here.
7. Matthew McKnight, features editor.
8. Sandra Upson, senior editor. Stories here, here, here, and here.

They range in length! We run some at 2,000 words, and (a very few) at 10,000. But about 5,000 words is the sweet spot.

Please take a look at recent issues of the magazine and read WIRED online to gauge whether your story idea seems like a match. And please check to see if we have run similar stories recently. (It’s also a good idea to make sure the story you’re pitching hasn’t been covered elsewhere. If it has been, please tell us how your proposed piece will advance existing coverage.)

Honestly? Don’t. WIRED staff writers cover breaking tech news, culture, science, and business. We aren’t really set up to take newsy freelance pieces.

The freelance budget for those stories is very limited. The Science desk covers timely stories about current science research and issues; our areas of coverage include health and medicine, biotech, environment and climate, space, energy and robotics. The most successful pitches to the Business desk will tell WIRED readers about people and companies they know little or nothing about, and how they are changing the world, for good or ill. We are particularly interested in stories about people, companies and trends outside of North America that have wider implications and importance.

Pitches to the Service desk should be actionable, informative stories that help readers make the most of technology, make smarter decisions about their purchases, or offer practical tips to help readers understand how technology influences their lives. Pitches to WIRED Games should look beyond traditional hype for video games and the industry to the role that video games play as a cultural force, a critical look at gaming culture, or to a deeper dive or review of a game, series, or cultural trend.

1. For science pitches, write to Kara Platoni, kara_platoni@wired.com.
2. For business pieces, contact both Natasha Bernal, natasha_bernal@wired.com and Scott Thurm, scott_thurm@wired.com.
3. For service pitches or gaming pitches, contact Alan Henry, alan_henry@wired.com.

Yes. We welcome insights from all manner of experts—scientists, scholars, policy analysts, laborers. These pieces are generally unpaid. Please see our op-ed guidelines here, and send pitches to opinion@wired.com.