ERC Funding Opportunities

• What is ERC?

The European Research Council (ERC) is the most important European funding organization for excellent frontier research.

It enables researchers from any nationality and from any field of science to get funding for their creative, original and ground-breaking research projects.

As part of the new Horizon Europe program, the overall ERC budget covering the period 2021-2027 reaches € 16 billion.

• Which cost does it cover?

An ERC grant can cover 100% of the project cost, which includes all direct costs such as personal cost, consumables, travels, publications, equipment, plus a 25% of indirect costs.

• Which scheme is for me?

For the youngsters: ERC Starting is targeting the young postdoc fellows, from 2 up to 7 years post-PhD. With up to € 1.5 M, it will make your dream reality: building your team around your own ideas. Such grants are also a fantastic opportunity to establish yourself as independent PI and gives a unprecedent kick in getting a secured academic position at the BOKU. You are intrigued, then follow this link (ERC-Stg).

For the solidifiers: You are just above 7 years post-PhD, and passed the ERC-Starting eligibility... Do not give up, try the ERC Consolidators. The call targets researchers from 7 up to 12 years after their PhD. With up to € 2.0 M, this funding can significantly strengthen your group and enlarge your scientific reputation. You need more info before you draft your proposal, check it here (ERC-CoG).

For the established wisers: If you are an experienced researcher with a significant track-record, then the ERC Advanced is for you. With a lump sum of up to € 2.5 M, this grant will sustain your scientific leadership. You are ready for the big change, then find what you need here (ERC-AdG).

You are not sure in which group you are or if you might be able to prolong it, then check your eligibility with the calculator here.

• Do not forget:

1. Too young to be too old: You´ve just passed the eligibility period. Do not worry, this might be prolonged under certain circumstances (check this here).
2. You are greedy: This funding is not enough for your research. No worry, an additional € 1.0 M might be added in top of the mentioned funding (check the criteria below*).

* Additional funding up to € 1.0 M can be requested to cover “start-up” costs for PI moving to EU, purchase major equipment, access to large facilities and any other major experimental & field work costs.

• Some stats to get motivated.

Around € 700 M has been dedicated this year to each of the described ERC scheme, with between 275 up to 480 grantees per scheme.

With a success rate far to be lower than other national funding schemes (close to 15%), 535 grantees from various Austrian´s Universities were able to successfully get their applications accepted since 2007, and 21 ERC-StG were selected only the last this year (2024).

ERC 2023-2024: Fresh Facts and Figures

ERC-2024-Starting Grants​​​​​​: Results are finally online!

• ​​​​Almost 3500 applications
• Allocated budget of €780 million for ± 500 projects (success rate of 14.2%)
• Domain Distribution: 42% in Physical Sciences and Engineering / 30% Social Science and 28% Life Science
• 24 candidates were selected to conduct their research in Austrian´s Universities (more info here).

ERC-2024-Consolidator Grants: First Results Published

• 2287 submitted Applications for 328 funded proposals
• Total budget of €678 million
• 11 Projects from Top researchers Austria are selected  (find list here).

ERC-2023-Advanced Grants:

• 1829 submitted applications for 255 accepted grants
• Total budget of €652 million
• 12 projects were funded from excellent researchers in Austria, with one from BOKU (find the complete list here). Congrats to Prof. Wei Wu from the Institute of Geotechnical Engineering wo will start his new project called MOTRAN for Modelling transient granular flow! This is the 14^th ERCs for BOKU since it´s inception. We wish him & his team a great success!

• Stop procrastinating. Now it´s your turn!

Important deadlines for the calls 2025-2026.

ERC Advanced 2025 → Opens on 22^nd May 2025 and closes on the 28^th of August 2025

ERC Starting 2026 → Deadline will be on 14^th October 2025. Templates for the ERC-StG-2026 are here.

ERC Consolidators 2026 → Deadline will be on 13^rd January 2026. Templates for the ERC-CoG-2026 will come soon.

ERC Advanced 2026 → Deadline will be on 27^th August 2026.

The full working program WP2026 can be seen here.