The three student routes we mean here
A studentship pays your fees and a stipend while you do a PhD or DPhil. A fellowship or intensive is a shorter, often full-time, paid stint of research, sometimes open to students as well as early-career researchers. A venture-scientist programme helps researchers test a company idea without taking equity up front.
This article is only about those fellowship-style routes. Credits, grants and competitions sit in other guides; the guides hub is the place to switch tracks. Our fellowships guide explains the differences in more detail.
Funded PhDs and CDTs, in brief
If you want a 2027-entry funded AI PhD in the UK, start with Funded AI PhDs and UKRI CDTs in the UK, which already walks through stipends, home and international fee status, and the open centres.
Deadlines still ahead include UKRI AI CDT in Designing Responsible NLP (PhD, 2027 entry) (30 November 2026), UKRI AI CDT in Decision Making for Complex Systems (PhD, 2027 entry) (4 December 2026), Oxford AIGI DPhil Studentships in AI Governance (Track I) (midday UK time, 2 December 2026), then January dates for UKRI CDT in Citizen-Centred AI (PhD, 2027 entry), Leverhulme Centre for Algorithmic Life: funded PhD studentships (Autumn 2027), Sheffield PhD: Neurosymbolic World Models for Robotic Manipulation, UKRI AI CDT in Biomedical Innovation (PhD, 2027 entry) and the Oxford AIMS / AIGI Track II routes. RobotX PhD Fellowship 2027 is a fully funded ETH Zurich PhD, closing 27 November 2026.
Paid fellowships and intensives open to students
- LawAI Summer Research Fellowship (Legal Frontiers): a 10-week paid programme, 14 June to 20 August 2027, remote-first, with a convening week in Washington, DC. Official rates are $1,800 per week (US) or £1,000 per week (EU/UK); higher subsidies may be possible for exceptional experience. It is open to graduate law students, final-year undergraduate law students, PhD candidates, postdocs, professionals and legal academics. Applications close at 11:59pm ET on 29 January 2027. LawAI Summer Fellowship (US) is a related US track, listed at Weekly subsidy: $2,000.
- Iliad Fellowship: a fully funded alignment-theory fellowship with a $6,000 a month travel-and-housing allowance, in London or the SF Bay Area. Cohorts start most months. The January 2027 cohort closes 16 November 2026, so that intake is tight; later cohorts remain on a rolling calendar.
- Lightcone Research Fellowship (first cohort): a remote fellowship from December 2026 to February 2027 for early-career researchers with a specific project to run with AI agents. It offers frontier model credits, support, and travel to a Paris summit. Four to six fellows; deadline 20 November 2026.
Iliad Intensive, January 2027 also closes 16 November 2026, for a 4–29 January 2027 intensive. The organiser does not state a stipend on the listing.
Research-to-startup, without mixing categories
Conception X Venture Scientist 100 (Spring 2027) is a free programme for researchers and students, with no fees and no equity taken. Apply by 6 December 2026 for a Spring 2027 cohort in the UK and Europe (hybrid). Top performers can pitch partner investors for up to £300,000 (XTX Ventures and the CX angel syndicate). That pitch is a later opportunity, not a grant paid to every participant.
How to choose, and what we have left out
If you want three or four funded years, apply to CDTs and project studentships and work backwards from the December and January deadlines. If you want a summer of paid research, LawAI has a realistic window into January. If you want to test a spin-out, Conception X closes 6 December 2026.
A few doctoral calls close this week, including IMPRS-IS doctoral program (2027 hiring round) on 15 November 2026, so only chase those if your application is already complete. For competitions, credits or grants, use the guides hub rather than this page. Open studentships and fellowships are on our fellowships list.
