Most important adjustments SSH Open Competition M and L
- The Open Competition M and L will be merged into one instrument.
- Researchers may submit a pre-proposal immediately after obtaining their PhD, if they have a permanent contract or a tenure-track agreement with a research organisation.
- The budget to be requested is flexible and ranges from €350,000 to €800,000.
- The pre-application phase uses distributed peer review (where applicants assess each other’s pre-applications). This means that applicants are also required to act as reviewers. Researchers may submit one application annually within the SSH Open Competition as a whole, but no more than one application per calendar year (including the SSH Open Competition XS).
- If the applicant already has an OC project (NWO or ZonMW), a new application may only be submitted if this project’s end date lies within one year of the pre-application deadline.
The SGW OC M/L Call for Proposals is expected to be published in mid-September 2026 (deadline for the pre-proposals no earlier than November 2026; and deadline for full applications expected before the summer of 2027).
The Open Competition XS will continue in its current form, but from 2027, it will also be open to researchers immediately after they have obtained their PhD. This Call for proposals is expected to be published in mid-September 2026 (with three rounds in 2027 and expected deadlines in January, April, and September).
More information can be found here; or you can reach out to Grantsupport-FSW [at] ru.nl (FSW Grant Support).