ECR Poster Prize Competition

The UKCCSRC have been running the ECR Poster Prize Competition at conferences for many years, with a wide range of research project posters being presented.  On this page, we share the winners from the past few years, as well as good practice wisdom from the professionals who have judged them.

Top tips

• Highlight key points rather than reproduce a paper in poster form – too much text is often cited for low marks
• Always think about your audience and adapt your content to fit – they are unlikely to be specialists in your field
• Share how the research fits into the wider context, its real-world implications and potential impact/value/uses
• If sharing results, include a discussion of them and conclusions
• Use clear headings to give shape and structure, and create flow (the route you want your audience to take with reading the information)
• Put key information at the height of the average eyeline – it’s what people will see first and focus on most
• Make good use of diagrams and photos, rather than just text
• Caption all figures, images, tables, etc. so it’s clear what they’re showing
• Font size should be minimum 24 point
• Be careful with the use of colour – it can enhance or detract
• Consider using QR codes if you want to direct people to papers, etc.
• When you’ve designed the poster, step back from it to check how it looks from the audience’s viewpoint
• Have someone proof-read for clarity and typos