Finding Funding

Where to start?

When identifying funding for your project it's usually useful to start by investigating which funders colleagues in your School or Institute are already receiving funding from.  Speak to your manager, peers, other academics, your School research administrator or your Edinburgh Research Office Research Funding Specialist.

School & College web and Intranet sites

Find my Research Funding Specialist [Your University Login required]

Identify Funding

Types of Funding Available [Your University Login required]

Find Funding - Details of engagement and impact funding [Your University Login required]

It’s also worth considering the wider UK research funding landscape, as an understanding of this is important for identifying funding trends and funder strategies

UK Funding Landscape [Your University Login required]

UK Research Funders [Your University Login required]

Guide to Applying for UK Funding [Your University Login required]

Funding Opportunities Calendar

Edinburgh Research Office provides a Funding Opportunities Hub, including funding insights and intelligence. Linked below you will find the Funding Opportunities Calendar, as well as access to guidance and general information on a number of funding schemes and funders.  

Funding opportunities can be presented in a number of ways 

• An open call for a particular type of proposal with no deadline, you can apply when your bid is ready
• A specific call for a particular type of proposal, or a specific research topic with a deadline.  These can be either one off or recurring.  Fellowship calls are usually once or twice a year, every year, recurring.

Funding opportunities calendar [Your University Login required]

ResearchProfessional

ResearchProfessional is a web service which provides research funding news and a comprehensive database of research funding opportunities. The University of Edinburgh subscribes to this service, which means you can use it to identify potential funding for your research.  Using the links below, select "University of Edinburgh" and login with your usual University login.

Login to ResearchProfessional [external link]

How to use ResearchProfessional

Eligibility

Research Remit

Most funders have a research remit that they focus their funding within, please note the funder is likely to have strategies or preferences even within their remit where they are more likely to fund some topics or approaches than others.  Speaking to your colleagues, getting your proposal peer reviewed before submission and using the funder intelligence resource from ERO are some of the ways to understand these preferences and increase your chances of success.

Funder Intelligence

If you aren't sure which of the UKRI research councils (AHRC, BBSRC, ESRC, EPSRC, MRC, NERC & STFC) your project falls into, or if your project is on a boundary, use the remit query service of the council you think is closest to the area of your project before you submit.

Who can lead a bid?

As well as a research remit, most funders also provide details of who they consider to be eligible to apply for or to lead bids they award.  Some funders are open to researchers applying and leading their own projects, others prefer to limit the project leadership responsibilities to academics on an open ended research & teaching contract.  If you aren't eligible to lead a project the funder may offer a "Researcher Co-Investigator" option, where you can demonstrate your involvement in developing the proposal even though you don't have the appropriate contract to take financial responsibility.

University of Edinburgh's Major Research Funders

When identifying funding for your project its usually useful to start by investigating which funders colleagues in your School or Institute are already receiving funding from.  There are many funders of various sizes that provide funding for research, the list below links to some of the largest funders awarding grants to UK universities  - this list is not exhaustive.