Which UK funder is for you?
The quickest way to narrow things down is to ask who would hold the grant.
| Funder | Usually funds | Open example |
|---|---|---|
| Innovate UK | UK-registered businesses, mostly SMEs, sometimes with partners | Frontier AI: SME Champions, Phase 1 |
| UKRI research councils (e.g. EPSRC) | Researchers at UK research organisations eligible for UKRI funding | UKRI: Enabling AI adoption across science and engineering |
| ARIA | Teams working on a specific ARIA programme, from any type of organisation | ARIA Robot Locomotion programme call (concept papers) |
All three run time-limited calls with a fixed brief, so the question is usually not "can I get a UK AI grant?" but "is there a call open right now that matches my project?". Our grants list shows the open ones, soonest deadline first.
Innovate UK: grants for AI companies
Innovate UK runs competitions for businesses through the government's Innovation Funding Service. Each competition has its own scope, eligibility, project size and closing time. Recent AI competitions show the range:
- Frontier AI: SME Champions, Phase 1: Share of up to £3.1 million; project costs £150,000–£250,000, for feasibility studies by UK-registered SMEs.
- Efficient, Structured and Controllable AI Systems: Share of up to £1.66 million; project costs £50,000–£150,000, for experimental validation of prototype AI systems.
- BridgeAI Deployment Catalyst: AI for Operational Systems: Share of up to £5 million; grant request £100,000–£200,000 per project. This one is collaborative: the lead must be a UK-registered AI SME, working with a UK medium or large organisation that will deploy the solution.
"Share of up to £X" is the total pot for the competition, split between the winning projects. The figure that matters for your budget is the project size range, such as £150,000 to £250,000 for the SME Champions call.
Smaller, faster calls also appear through Innovate UK Business Connect, such as iX Challenge: Edge AI with Low Size, Weight, Power and Cost (Grant funding request up to £60,000).
UKRI research councils: grants for researchers
If you work at a university or another research organisation, the UKRI councils are the main route. Their AI calls usually fund a share of the project's full economic cost (FEC), not the whole of it:
- UKRI: Enabling AI adoption across science and engineering: Total fund £5,000,000; maximum award £250,000 (UKRI funds 80% of FEC); projects up to 1 year from 26 Apr 2027.
- UKRI: Transformative sustainable AI technologies: Up to £602,500 FEC per project (UKRI funds 80%); £12.05M total.
- UKRI: Integration of AI/HPC with quantum computing: Total fund £17,000,000; maximum award £3,750,000.
Eligibility is set at two levels: your organisation must be eligible for UKRI funding, and you must meet UKRI's individual eligibility rules. Calls often have a fixed project start date, so check that your team can start on time.
For researchers who want to explore commercialising their work, EPSRC AI ICURe Discover Sprint (February 2027) is a lighter first step (Up to £2,500), open to researchers and technicians at UK institutions, including AI CDT students.
ARIA: programme calls for ambitious research
ARIA, the Advanced Research and Invention Agency, funds work within its own programmes rather than open-topic grants. Calls are tied to a programme's goals and often run in stages. For example, ARIA Robot Locomotion programme call (concept papers) asks for concept papers first, with full proposals later, and is open to any type of organisation in any location, with a UK benefit case expected. ARIA Robot Dexterity: Benchmarks, Standards and Interoperability call is another current call.
ARIA programme pages usually quote the programme budget rather than an amount per project, so read the call documents for what a single award can cover.
Deadlines and timings to watch
- Check the closing time, not just the date. The Innovate UK competitions above close at 11:00am UK time, while the UKRI calls close at 4:00pm UK time. Submitting in the afternoon of an Innovate UK deadline day is too late.
- Some calls have two stages. Concept papers or outlines come first, full proposals later, as with ARIA.
- Collaborative calls take longer. If you need a partner, as for BridgeAI, agree the partnership well before the deadline.
- Calls close for good. Most UK AI competitions are one-off or annual. Our listings drop calls once they close, and the grants guide explains how to prepare before the next one opens.
How to put together a strong application
- Read the scope first. Each call says what it will and won't fund. If your project only fits with a stretch, it probably doesn't fit.
- Check eligibility line by line: where you're registered, your organisation type, company size, and whether you can apply alone.
- Build the budget to the call's rules: project size limits, the share of costs the funder pays, and the project length and start date.
- Show the route to impact. UK public funders want to see who benefits and how the work will be used, whether that's a product, a deployment or research others can build on.
- Submit a day early. Funding portals can be slow on deadline day.