Research Excellence Scholarship

UCL’s prestigious Research Excellence Scholarship (UCL-RES) aims to attract outstanding scholars to undertake doctoral research at UCL.

For 2026/27 we are offering 40 fully funded UCL Research Excellence Scholarships (UCL-RES) to exceptional applicants from any country. Only prospective UCL MPhil/PhD and EngD students can apply. This means students who will begin on or after the academic year 2026/27 first permitted MPhil/PhD start date of 1 October 2026. Students who started at UCL before this date are not eligible to apply. 

Please see our UCL-RES scholars’ testimonials to see how the scholarship has impacted our community of scholars.

Eligibility

To APPLY, you must:

• have submitted a complete admission application to an eligible** full- or part-time degree programme at UCL by the scholarship deadline;
• hold or expect to achieve at least an upper second-class Honours UK undergraduate degree or equivalent qualification.

To be AWARDED IF SELECTED, you must:

• be in receipt of an offer of admission to a full-time or part-time research degree programme at UCL.
  
  ** PLEASE NOTE Distance learning, non-resident PhD and professional doctorates (DClinPsy, DDent, DEdPsy (Brain Sciences), DOrth and DPsychotherapy) are not eligible for this scholarship. EngD are not considered Professional Doctorates here and are eligible to apply.

Value, benefits, and duration

The UCL-RES scholarship consists of full tuition fees (either Home or Overseas) plus a maintenance stipend during the research portion of the programme which increases each year with inflation. For 2025/26, the stipend rate is £22,780 for full-time study (rates are calculated 'pro rata' for part-time students). For 2026/27, the stipend rate is to be confirmed.

The scholarship also includes additional research costs of up to £1,200 per year for the standard duration of the research portion of the programme.

Awards are made for the standard length of the research portion of the programme of study. This is normally 3 years for a full-time MPhil/PhD/EngD degree programme (or 5 years for part-time study), subject to sufficient academic progress. Please note the funding does not cover CRS/writing up year(s).

Where students are undertaking an integrated doctoral programme with a standard length of four years, the award will be extended to the 4th year of research.

If awarded, funding begins at the start of the next academic year. For 2026/27 this is  1^st October 2026

Selection process

Step 1: Submit your UCL-RES applications directly to the academic department you have applied to.  
Please see the How to Apply section below for more details about this step.

Step 2: Each academic department is part of a faculty. Your academic department will submit applications to their faculty who will review them. They will divide applicants into priority bands based on merit, suitability of project proposal for the supervisors available and disciplinary need. They will also identify the Research Excellence Framework (REF) thematic disciplinary area of each application. These will be one of the 4 themes below:-

Theme 1 – Medicine, Health, and Life Sciences
Theme 2 – Physical Sciences, Engineering, and Mathematics
Theme 3 – Social Sciences
Theme 4 – Arts and Humanities

Once this review is complete, each faculty will then nominate their shortlist to a central panel.

Step 3: The central UCL Selection panel will then make 40 awards from the shortlist of 120 nominations from all UCL faculties, using the priority bands and ensuring balance between the thematic disciplinary areas. Where there is oversubscription within a thematic area, they will use a lottery to determine the awards. The panel is chaired by the Pro Vice Provost (Doctoral School and Early Career Research Staff).

Please note: Financial circumstances are not considered for the purposes of this scholarship.

How to apply

To apply for the UCL-RES, you must complete the following steps: 

Step 1 - apply for admission to UCL

You must submit a complete application for admission onto an eligible degree programme by the 9^th January 2026. You do not need to have secured an offer of a place at UCL to apply for the scholarship, but you must have submitted a complete admission application.

Step 2 - submit your scholarship application documents to your academic department

You must contact your academic department/institute/division/unit to notify them that you would like to be considered for the UCL-RES and submit the below documents 1-4 to them. Please note that your references (document 5) must be submitted by your referee directly to your academic department by the 9^th January 2026 deadline. You can use this list of faculty and department contacts to find the contact details for your department. Please contact the Administrator or your supervisor for guidance on where to send your scholarship application materials www.ucl.ac.uk/doctoral-school/key-contacts/faculty-and-department-contacts .

The mandatory documents are as follows:

1. Research Scholarships cover sheet - download  Research Scholarship Cover Sheet.docx
2. CV – Please ensure your CV is up to date and lists all publications, past/current prizes, awards, and scholarships. 
3. A lay summary of your research proposal, in a Word or PDF document (max. 200 words not including title).  A lay summary is aimed at explaining your research proposal to specialists and non specialists alike so please bear this in mind when writing your research proposal/outline. Please describe clearly – in language which can be understood by academics from any discipline – the aim of your research, the methodology you will use, and the potential significance of this study to your discipline. It is extremely important that you pay attention to this summary and write in as clear language as possible as it may significantly affect the outcome of your application. The proposal should be written by you, not your supervisor or any other member of academic department staff.
4. Academic transcripts - Please ensure you submit transcripts from all undergraduate and postgraduate programmes you have attended and that each academic transcript submitted includes clarification on the grading scale/range of grades possible for that degree.
5. 2 References 

Reference 1 Recent Study

Reference 1 Recent Study

Reference number 1 should relate to your most recently completed university programme/degree (or the one you intend to complete, if applicable). This can be the same referee who submitted a reference as part of your admission, however your UCL-RES reference must be submitted on the Reference Form 1.

Reference 2 Supervisor

Reference 2 Supervisor

Reference number 2 should relate to your intended research programme/project, for which you are seeking funding. This reference MUST be provided by your research supervisor at UCL. If  you have not yet identified a supervisor, please check the webpage of the relevant UCL department you wish to apply to, identify a potential supervisor who has relevant expertise in your preferred field of interest, and contact them directly.

Please note that Referee 1 and Referee 2 must be two different people. Please find below our PDF of guidance for referees. We suggest you provide your referee with a copy of this document when asking for an academic reference. References must be submitted directly to your academic department by your referee by the 9^th January 2026 scholarship deadline. The only exception to this is if your academic department has explicitly told you that the references can be submitted at a later date.

UCL Guidance for Referees (PDF)

UCL Guidance for Referees (PDF)

You must submit both a completed admission application and a completed UCL-RES application to your academic department no later than Friday, 9^th January 2026.

Please be aware that some academic departments set their own deadlines which may be earlier than this date, so make sure you check with them directly.

Results

The panel will meet and applicants will be notified of final decisions by mid March 2026.