Synergy Grant
Synergy Grant supports groups of researchers and their teams pursuing ambitious frontier research that requires combined expertise to achieve advances beyond the reach of a single investigator.
Funder: European Research Council
Due Dates: November 5, 2025 (2026 call deadline) | February 17, 2027 (2027 call opens) | May 11, 2027 (2027 call deadline)
Funding Amounts: Up to €10 million over six years, plus up to €4 million in justified additional funding
Summary: Supports groups of two to four researchers tackling ambitious frontier research problems that no single investigator could address alone.
Key Information: Each PI must commit at least 30% of working time to the project.
Description
The European Research Council’s Synergy Grant supports small groups of principal investigators (PIs) and their teams jointly addressing ambitious research problems beyond the capacity of any individual investigator working alone. Funded through Horizon Europe, the programme welcomes research across science, scholarship, and engineering, without predetermined thematic priorities. It seeks substantial advances at the frontiers of knowledge, including new methods, unconventional approaches, and work crossing disciplinary boundaries.
The collaboration must be essential to the research, not simply a network or loose cooperation. Applicants must explain how their combined expertise, approaches, teams, and infrastructure enable the proposed advances. Scientific excellence is the sole assessment criterion, encompassing the project’s ambition, the investigators’ intellectual capacity and creativity, and the outstanding synergetic effect of their work together.
