[D] ACL ARR 2026 Jan cycle — Does the commitment track have to match the track chosen during ARR submission?

During ARR submission we selected a topic area / track, but now when committing the paper to ACL I see that the system allows us to choose a track again, and it looks like it can be different from the one selected during the ARR submission.

We originally selected the Resources and Evaluation track during the ARR submission stage. However, when committing the paper to ACL, we are considering changing the track to Sentiment Analysis, Stylistic Analysis, and Argument Mining. In fact, during the initial submission one of our key topics was stylistic analysis and stylistic generation, so this track may actually align better with the paper’s focus.

So I wanted to ask people who have gone through this before:

• Does the commitment track need to match the original ARR track, or can it be different?
• If it can be different, is it recommended to keep it the same, or do people sometimes change it based on better fit with the paper?
• Are there any downsides or risks if the track is changed at the commitment stage?

Would really appreciate insights from anyone who has committed an ARR paper to ACL/EMNLP/NAACL before.