Currently 3 active tech and infrastructure grants, fellowships and residencies open to applicants in the UK. Hand-curated and updated weekly. Almost every entry is funded; a few notable unpaid open calls and festival submissions are included as clearly flagged exceptions. Browse the list below, or use the interactive desk for filtering and shortlisting.
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The British Open-ended Learning and Discovery (BOLD) Lab is a new UKRI-funded initiative establishing an AI research laboratory led from the University of Oxford, bringing more than 80 researchers from Oxford, UCL and Imperial College London under one vision. It carries an initial investment of around GBP 8 million with the potential for a further GBP 22 million extending the investment over six years, making it one of the UK's largest bets on fundamental AI research. The lab's remit is ambitious, high-risk work on the fundamental science of artificial intelligence, alongside training future leaders in the field. THE ROLE: up to 12 BOLD Fellows are being recruited across the three universities. Fellows are expected to operate with a high level of independence and responsibility, setting their own research direction, publishing at the highest level, and mentoring junior researchers and doctoral students. They also play a leading role in managing the lab and take responsibility for developing its strategic and scientific direction, with primary responsibility for a programme of independent funded research projects. The posting frames the draw as exceptional independence, direct collaboration with world-leading colleagues across the three institutions, access to substantial and rapidly growing compute, and real influence over the intellectual direction and culture of a major national lab. WHO SHOULD APPLY: senior researchers with an established, original research track record in AI or a closely related field, who are a recognised authority in their area. HOW TO APPLY: submit an online application with a covering letter or supporting statement, a CV, and details of two referees. Informal enquiries are welcomed beforehand to the BOLD Exec Team at boldexec-team@eng.ox.ac.uk. NOTE: this is a salaried fixed-term research post rather than a grant. Only applications received before midday on Tuesday 15 September 2026 can be considered.
The British Council's standing Travel Grant Fund helps early to mid-career UK filmmakers and XR creatives represent their work abroad, build networks, reach new audiences and raise the international profile of new and emerging UK film and immersive talent. Supported by BFI National Lottery funding in partnership with BFI NETWORK and the BFI International Fund. WHAT IT FUNDS: travel to attend international film festivals, showcases, training and development labs, and co-production forums, across five strands: short film festival grants, feature film festival grants, interactive/XR grants (including VR, immersive storytelling experiences and installations), lab grants and co-production forum grants. AMOUNTS: short and feature festival grants GBP 150 to 1,500 (typically up to GBP 750); XR travel-only grants GBP 150 to 1,500; large XR grants GBP 1,500 to 5,000; lab grants up to GBP 6,000; co-production forum grants up to GBP 2,000. WHO CAN APPLY: UK residents or citizens aged 18+; applicants can be directors, producers or writers attached to the selected project. KEY CONDITIONS: the festival, lab or forum must appear on the British Council's Key Lists of eligible events, and the project must be registered on the British Council's UK Project Database. DEADLINE: rolling, no fixed deadlines; submit at least two weeks before the event starts (retrospective applications for past events are not accepted). Free to apply.
The ILIAD Intensive is a four-week, full-time, in-person program for mathematically strong researchers interested in foundational AI alignment, running in London (at LISA) and in Berkeley. It runs five days a week, 10am to 6pm, in cohorts of 15 to 30 participants. CURRICULUM, across five clusters: Alignment (decomposing the alignment problem, pretraining, post-training and deployment, reward learning); Learning (deep learning theory, singular learning theory, training dynamics); Abstractions, Representations and Interpretability (mechanistic interpretability, natural latents); Agency (reinforcement learning, decision theory, agent foundations); and Safety Guarantees (debate, steganography, the limits of interpretability). MONEY: no tuition is charged. Each participant receives a USD 5,000 travel and housing allowance, office space at the venue, and lunch and dinner five days a week. Participants book and pay for their own travel and accommodation out of the allowance. ELIGIBILITY: a strong mathematical background, typically graduate-level study or a completed degree in mathematics, physics or theoretical computer science, though mathematical maturity is weighted more heavily than specific credentials. Research experience, general competence and motivation are also assessed. Prior machine learning or alignment experience is not required. DEADLINE: no fixed closing date is published. A single application covers several upcoming programs and applicants indicate their preferred dates and locations; applications are being accepted for the October 2026 and November 2026 cohorts. HOW TO APPLY: through the application portal at iliad.ac/apply. Questions to contact@iliad.ac.