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21st International Workshop

on High Performance Transaction Systems (HPTS)

October 4-7, 2026

Asilomar Conference Grounds, Pacific Grove, CA

About HPTS

Every two years, HPTS brings together a lively and opinionated group of technologists to discuss and debate the pressing topics that affect today's systems and their design and implementation, especially where performance and scalability is concerned. The workshop includes position paper presentations, panels, moderated discussions, and significant time for casual interaction. The presentations are not recorded, and the only publications are slide decks by presenters, who are strongly encouraged to post them.

What are the topics?

Since its inception in 1985, HPTS has always been about large-scale systems --- systems that extend the state-of-the-art. Over the years the focus has expanded from scalable transaction processing to very large databases to cloud computing. Today, scalability is also about data analytics, machine learning, agentic data systems and globally distributed systems. Here are some of the questions and topics we hope 2026 participants will address:

• OLTP and OLAP at Scale:OLTP and OLAP in the Cloud, Open Formats, Hybrid Systems, Revolution vs Evolution,Operational Analytics, the Return of Small Data
• Data Stores: Consistency and coordination, performance under failures, impact of cost, latency vs correctness
• Hardware: Novel memory architectures, GPU management, Compute offload and accelerators, Silicon, cost vs performance
• Distributed Systems: Managing and debugging huge systems, heterogeneous hardware at scale, metastable failures, networking
• Platforms: lifecycles of application at scale, semantics of reliability and durability, containerization, edge, compliance, confidential computing
• Systems for AI/ML: training and inference bottlenecks, systems for agents, reliability, MLOps
• ML for Systems: how can we use ML techniques to improve and scale existing systems?
• Other stuff, too: Other topics are welcome, as long as they are likely to be of interest to people building large-scale and/or data-intensive systems.

Submission process

• Send something thought-provoking to us: If you would like to attend, please submit a short technical position paper (no more than one page) that presents a viewpoint on a controversial topic, a summary of lessons learned, experience with a large or unusual system, an innovative mechanism, an enormous problem looming on the horizon, or anything else that convinces the program committee that you have something interesting to say to builders of large-scale systems. In addition to controversial positions, we also welcome thoughts from practitioners who are consuming such large-scale systems and have to handle various real-world constraints.
• Easy and simple submission process: The submission process is very lightweight, in part to attract systems developers who can't set aside time to write a paper.
• Authorship: Authorship of proposals is a consideration for invitations to the conference. Each submission can have only one author, and each author may submit only one proposal. Nevertheless, please feel free to report on joint work if you are asked to present.

The nature of the HPTS workshop

The workshop is by invitation-only, and there will be about 100 participants. Invitations are not transferable. The submissions drive both the invitation process and the workshop agenda. Participants may be asked to give a presentation at the workshop. Students are particularly encouraged to submit and will enjoy a discounted workshop fee.

What to submit

• Take a stand: A one-page abstract or position statement, as text or as a link to a pdf, in 10pt font or larger. We do not want polished papers… Convince us you have interesting ideas!
• Tell us who you are and what interests you: Optionally, a short summary of the corresponding author's current work, such as a link to the author's homepage or LinkedIn page, or a short bio added to the position statement (beyond the one page).
• Additional material: Optionally, a link to one or both of the following:
• Maximum of 3 PowerPoint or pdf slides, augmenting your position statement.
• Maximum 2-minute video illustrating your position statement, such as a demo or a presentation of you speaking (with or without slides).
• Short and sweet: The length limits will be strictly enforced. We won't consider submissions that exceed the maximum length.

Important Dates

• Position papers due: April 1, 2026
• Notification of invitation: June 1, 2026
• HPTS Workshop: October 4-7, 2026

Where to submit

Please submit a link to your abstract via this web form: HPTS 2026 Submission Form

Questions?

If you have any questions or feedback, please send it to: hpts2026@gmail.com