A dissertation timeline is built backwards. The submission date is fixed, and so are the dates before it: the proposal, the ethics form, the draft your supervisor reads, and for a doctorate the reviews and the viva. What lies between them is the time you actually have.
This is the timeline guide to our dissertation guide, published by EdCitation. Every date and rule below was read on 26 September 2026 in a university's own handbook or regulations: Edinburgh, Manchester, Exeter, Leeds and Sheffield in the UK, Duke and Cornell in the US, and the University of Queensland in Australia. Where they differ, the tables show it.
EdCitation never writes any part of a dissertation. It reads your handbook into a checklist with Check your paper, and keeps and checks your references from week 1.
How to plan a dissertation timeline, step by step
Start from the deadline and work towards today.
- Write down the submission date and time from the handbook, and every interim date: proposal, ethics form, supervision period, any draft deadline. Check your paper reads the handbook's requirements into a checklist; the dates you copy across yourself.
- Mark the last week for formatting, proofreading and final checks, not writing.
- Put revision before it, with the time your supervisor needs to return comments.
- Put ethical approval before any data collection, with the review time your university gives.
- Break the rest into tasks, give each a length, and draw them as a Gantt chart or week plan.
- Leave at least one empty week as a buffer, and start a tagged reference list in a free EdCitation account on day one.
- Before each draft goes to your supervisor, run its references through Verify references.
What dates does the university fix, and how do they differ?
The submission deadline, and usually a trail of earlier dates. They differ by level and by university.
| University and programme | Level | Fixed dates and rules |
|---|---|---|
| Edinburgh, School of Social and Political Science | Taught MSc | Supervisors allocated in March in most programmes, supervision from April; deadline 13 August 2026 at 23:59 |
| Alliance Manchester Business School | Taught master's | Title and Ethics Statement form by a published deadline; dissertation due 7 September 2026 at 14:00 |
| Duke | PhD and master's thesis, December 2026 degree | Apply to graduate by 1 October; first full submission by 6 November; defend by 20 November; final submission by 4 December |
| Exeter, Centre for Ecology and Conservation | PhD | Upgrade from MPhil started at 9 months, passed within 12 months full-time |
| Queensland | PhD | Confirmation at 12 months, reviews at 24 and 36 months, examination at 42 months (full-time equivalent) |
| Leeds | PhD | Viva normally within three months of the thesis reaching the examiners |
A taught master's: a summer on one date
The University of Edinburgh School of Social and Political Science (2025) sets one deadline for every MSc in the school, 13 August 2026 at 23:59, UK time. The same handbook calls that date a Thursday on one page and a Wednesday on another; 13 August 2026 is a Thursday. Put the date and the time in your plan, not the weekday, and ask the office if two pages disagree.
The handbook suggests finishing the early stages, which need your supervisor's input, by the end of May or early June, and a full draft in July. Supervision runs to three or four one-to-one meetings, and the supervisor reads one chapter, not the whole dissertation.
A doctorate in the US: dates counted back from the defence
Duke University Graduate School (n.d.) sets each degree's dates back from the conferral. For a December 2026 degree, the complete dissertation or master's thesis goes in by 6 November and at least two weeks before the defence, which must be held by 20 November. The examining committee must be approved at least 30 days before any exam, so a 20 November defence needs its committee approved in October.
How long does each stage of a dissertation take?
Longer than you would guess, and the universities read here give lengths for only a few stages: ethics review, supervisor feedback and the viva, which the University of Leeds (n.d.) says should normally follow within three months of the thesis reaching the examiners. None gave an official figure for a literature review or an analysis, and we have not invented one.
Ethics approval and data collection delays
Ethical approval can move the whole plan, because no data can be collected until it arrives. At Cornell, the IRB tells researchers to allow at least two to three weeks for an exempt project, at least three to four for expedited review, and at least four to six for full board review, which meets on the first Friday of each month (Cornell University Research Services, n.d.). Recruitment and data collection wait for its written approval, which it never gives retroactively.
In Edinburgh's school, a low-risk project can be approved by the supervisor, though not instantly. A higher-risk one goes to the programme director, and the University of Edinburgh School of Social and Political Science (2025) warns that this review may take several weeks; research needing College sponsorship adds around a month, sometimes more. Send the ethics application as early as the design allows, and draft your questionnaire or interview guide, and plan the pilot study, while you wait.
At Manchester's business school the ethics decision also fixes the topic: after the Ethics Statement form's deadline, a student may not switch to a topic that needs ethical approval (Alliance Manchester Business School, 2025).
Supervisor feedback on drafts
Edinburgh's school says to expect comments on written work within two weeks. A chapter sent in week 5 comes back by week 7, and the plan carries on meanwhile. Working with your supervisor compares what other universities' codes promise.
How do I draw a dissertation Gantt chart or week plan?
List the tasks down the side, the weeks along the top, and shade the weeks each task takes. The University of Sheffield (n.d.) recommends one because it shows the blocker tasks that must finish before the next can start, such as ethics review before data collection.
Sheffield's illustration, not a rule, gives three weeks each to background reading and ethics review, two each to the literature review, data collection and analysis, three days to act on feedback, and two days to formatting and the bibliography. In our view those two days hold only if the reference list has been kept all along.
Writing while you research
Write from the first week, not after the data. Alliance Manchester Business School (2025) tells students to write as much as they can as early as they can, and warns that data collection, literature reviews and reference lists take longer than expected. Edinburgh's handbook suggests a few hundred words a day while writing up, and a penultimate draft several weeks before the deadline.
In practice, draft the methodology while ethics is under review and the literature review while data comes in; a feasible topic makes those overlaps possible.
A worked plan: a 12-week master's summer dissertation
This plan is ours, not any university's. It assumes a taught master's with the proposal agreed and a supervisor allocated before week 1, and a low-risk interview or survey project. If yours needs higher-level ethics review, submit the form before week 1 or the plan will not hold.
| Week | Work | Fixed point or check |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ethics form submitted; chapter outline and timetable to supervisor | Start a tagged reference list in a free account |
| 2 | Literature reading; draft interview guide or questionnaire | Reading from Find sources |
| 3 | Revise the ethics form if asked; draft methodology | Ethics decision due |
| 4 | With approval: pilot, then start data collection; literature review drafted | Tag each source by chapter |
| 5 | Data collection; literature review chapter sent | Verify references before it goes |
| 6 | Buffer week: late participants, slow approval, illness | Nothing new starts |
| 7 | Data cleaned or transcribed; analysis begins; supervisor's comments back | Act on feedback |
| 8 | Analysis; findings chapter drafted | |
| 9 | Discussion chapter drafted | |
| 10 | Introduction and conclusion; full draft complete | References from a file on the whole draft |
| 11 | Revise against the handbook; cut to the word limit; write the abstract | Check your paper checklist ticked off |
| 12 | Format, proofread, final reference check; submit two days early | Mechanics QA on the final file |
The empty week 6 is deliberate; Sheffield also advises contingency time. Submitting two days early covers the upload that fails at 23:58, which is not an accepted excuse.
What if I cannot make the dissertation deadline?
Use the formal route before the deadline: an extension, or a mitigating (at some universities, exceptional) circumstances claim. Late work without one is penalised.
Late penalties, from the handbooks
At Edinburgh's school, a late dissertation loses 5 marks for each calendar day, up to seven days, then scores zero. Nothing is accepted, for any reason, once the submission point closes 18 days after the deadline. At Manchester's business school, work loses 10% of the available marks for each 24 hours, weekends and bank holidays included, and one second late counts as late.
Extensions and mitigating circumstances
Alliance Manchester Business School (2025) grants an extension only with accepted mitigating circumstances, and the application must go in before the deadline and at least 48 hours ahead of it. The panel weighs supervision and graduation too. An interruption of studies cannot be requested once the September deadline has passed, and at the exam board's discretion a late final dissertation may be treated as a resubmission, capped at 40%.
Edinburgh's route is its Exceptional Circumstances Service; an approved claim after the submission point has closed usually means a null sit and submission at the next diet, typically November or February, with the award delayed. Neither handbook normally accepts computer failure or lost data as grounds, and Edinburgh adds poor time management.
At doctoral level the route is a petition: Duke University Graduate School (2026) allows up to one more year, with the committee's approval and benchmarks to meet.
How do part-time and PhD timelines differ?
Around milestones set in the regulations, which part-time study stretches in proportion. In the first years, plan back from the milestone, not the thesis deadline.
| University | First milestone | Later milestones | Time limit |
|---|---|---|---|
| Exeter, Centre for Ecology and Conservation | Upgrade started at 9 months, passed within 12, full-time; pro rata part-time | Minor amendments within 2 months, or a second attempt within 3 | Not stated on the page read |
| Exeter, Human Geography | Upgrade started by 9 months, 18 part-time | Follow-up meeting about 10 months later | Not stated on the page read |
| Queensland | Confirmation at 12 months | Reviews at 24 and 36 months; examination at 42 months | Measured in full-time equivalent |
| Duke | Preliminary exam by the end of year 3 | Dissertation expected within 2 years of it | 4 years after the exam, or 7 after entry |
Confirmation and upgrade reviews
At Exeter's Centre for Ecology and Conservation, the upgrade needs a report of 3,000 to 5,000 words, including an expected timeline, and a viva with a panel (University of Exeter Doctoral College, n.d.). The first-year plan works back from month 9, not from the thesis.
The University of Queensland (n.d.) counts everything in full-time equivalent months, with an early checkpoint at 3 to 6 months before confirmation. A part-time candidate's calendar dates are later, but the sequence is the same, and a candidate asked to repeat a review has up to three months' full-time equivalent to answer the panel.
At Duke, leaves of absence do not delay the preliminary examination deadline, and extensions past the middle of the fourth year are granted only in unusual cases such as severe illness (Duke University Graduate School, 2026). The thesis defence then follows the dates in the first table.
How EdCitation fits the dissertation timeline
EdCitation is the best tool for the reference work in a dissertation plan, because it looks every reference up in the publisher's record and never writes one, which no chatbot can promise. A list kept and checked from week 1 is how the two days Sheffield's example leaves for the bibliography can be enough.
We ran Check your paper on 26 September 2026 on the requirements and deadline sections of Edinburgh's MSc handbook, pasted as text. It returned four rules, each with the sentence it came from: font, Times New Roman; font size, 12; page numbers, yes; and a word limit of 15,000, from "For most taught MSc programmes in SPS, the dissertation word limit is 15,000." Check that one against your programme: the same paragraph gives 18,000 for the MSc by Research and 10,000 for a few others. It set aside, as rules it does not check, the submission and deadline paragraph, the choice of 1.5 or double spacing, the 200-word abstract and the late penalty. The deadline itself did not come back as a rule. Those go into your plan by hand. The checklist is free.
A free EdCitation account keeps the reference list from week 1, each reference tagged by chapter, downloadable as a Word document, BibTeX or RIS, so the final week sorts a list, not rebuilds one; organising references with tags shows how. Before each draft, Verify references, free with no account, returns every entry verified, doubtful (shown as "check this") or not found, flags retracted papers, and never shows "could not check" as "not found". References from a file takes the whole draft, matches every in-text citation to the list and keeps the file so the next run shows what you fixed: three checks a month free, no limit with Pro at $8 a month.
In the final week, Mechanics QA, also Pro, checks formatting against the style, comments and tracked changes left in the file, citations, numbers and language; a handbook rule that differs, such as Edinburgh's 11-point footnotes, stays on your own checklist. Theoretics QA, part of Max at $24 a month, judges the draft against the handbook's instructions, quoting the draft and rewriting nothing; a year at once saves 25% (Pricing). None of these writes a word of your dissertation or promises a mark.
Quick questions
How long should I leave for ethics approval?
As long as your university says. Cornell's IRB asks for at least three to four weeks for expedited review and four to six for full board review, and Edinburgh's school warns that higher-level review may take several weeks.
Should I use a Gantt chart for my dissertation?
It helps, because it shows which tasks block others, such as ethics approval before data collection, as Sheffield's guidance says. A week-by-week table does the same for a short project.
Can I get an extension on my dissertation?
Usually only through the formal route, before the deadline. Manchester's business school requires accepted mitigating circumstances and an application at least 48 hours before the deadline, and neither Manchester nor Edinburgh normally accepts computer failure as grounds.
When is the PhD upgrade or confirmation review?
About a year in for full-time students, at the universities read here. Exeter's Centre for Ecology and Conservation starts the upgrade at 9 months and requires it passed within 12, and Queensland holds confirmation at 12 months full-time equivalent.
Can EdCitation make my dissertation timeline for me?
No. EdCitation's Check your paper reads your handbook's requirements into a checklist, free, but the dates and the plan are yours, and it never writes any part of a dissertation.
References
- Alliance Manchester Business School. (2025). Dissertation handbook for taught Masters programmes 2025/26. University of Manchester. https://documents.manchester.ac.uk/display.aspx?DocID=51928
- Cornell University Research Services. (n.d.). IRB FAQs. https://researchservices.cornell.edu/resources/irb-faqs
- Duke University Graduate School. (n.d.). Milestone and graduation information and deadlines. https://gradschool.duke.edu/academics/milestone-and-graduation-information-and-deadlines/
- Duke University Graduate School. (2026). Doctoral degree regulations. 2026-27 Graduate School Bulletin. https://graduateschool.bulletins.duke.edu/policies/academic/doctoral
- University of Edinburgh School of Social and Political Science. (2025). Taught MSc student dissertation handbook 2025-26. https://www.sps.ed.ac.uk/sites/default/files/assets/doc/Student%20Handbooks/2025-26/PG/SPS%20Taught%20MSc%20Student%20Dissertation%20Handbook%202025-26.pdf
- University of Exeter Doctoral College. (n.d.). Upgrade to PhD. Faculty of Environment, Science and Economy handbook. https://www.exeter.ac.uk/research/doctoralcollege/currentstudents/esehandbook/upgradetophd/
- University of Leeds. (n.d.). The viva. Postgraduate research students. https://students.leeds.ac.uk/postgraduate-research-thesis-viva/doc/viva
- University of Queensland. (n.d.). Higher degree by research candidature progression procedure. Policy and Procedure Library. https://policies.uq.edu.au/document/view-current.php?id=247
- University of Sheffield. (n.d.). How to plan a dissertation or final year project. StudySkills@Sheffield. https://sheffield.ac.uk/study-skills/research/methods/dissertation