Wellcome
Wellcome Trust
Wellcome is a global charitable foundation funding health research: discovery science plus three health challenges (mental health, climate and health, infectious disease). Flagship discovery schemes are the Early-Career Awards (salary + up to £400,000, usually 5 years), Career Development Awards (usually 8 years), and Discovery Awards for established researchers (average £3.5M).
Evaluation Criteria
- 1New direction: how does the proposal go beyond the "same-old" in the field? Reviewers explicitly score down direct continuations of existing work
- 2Positioning: is the applicant (and team) demonstrably placed to do this work, with the skills, environment, and track record it needs?
- 3Process: shortlisting by discipline-specific advisory groups, then written external expert review (shared with you pre-interview), then an interview committee, with the final call by the Discovery Research Decision Board
- 4Value: only necessary, well-justified costs; several cost types sit outside the Early-Career £400k cap (overheads up to 20% of direct costs are additional)
Proposal Structure
- •Submitted via the Wellcome Funding online platform, with your research office as approver, involve them at idea stage, not the week of the deadline
- •Research statement written for a mixed panel: plain language, minimal acronyms, sub-headings so a reviewer with 20 applications can navigate it
- •Career-stage schemes fund the grantholder's salary in full for the award period plus research expenses; Early-Career requires ≥80% of research time on the project
- •Costs itemised per Wellcome's allowed-cost list, request what the project needs and nothing decorative
Common Mistakes
- ×Rushing the application, Wellcome's own guidance leads with "avoid rushing"; eligibility problems found late cost applicants entire rounds
- ×Proposing a direct continuation of existing work, the creativity criterion asks exactly this question
- ×Writing for your subfield: jargon-dense statements score badly with the deliberately broad review groups
- ×Padding the budget with nice-to-haves, or conversely under-costing the plan
- ×Applying while holding (or having held) an equivalent career-stage award, check the exclusions before writing
Success Tips
- ✓Answer the two panel questions explicitly: what is genuinely new here, and why are you the person positioned to do it
- ✓Contact your research office when you first have the idea, they check eligibility and strengthen costings
- ✓Use the pre-interview reviewer comments seriously, the interview opens with a presentation and the committee expects you to have engaged with them
- ✓One further application per project is allowed after rejection if significantly changed, treat reviewer feedback as the redesign brief
Frequently Asked Questions
+Who can apply to Wellcome schemes?
Lead applicants must be based at an eligible organisation in the UK, Republic of Ireland, or a low- and middle-income country (excluding India and mainland China). Note: from 29 October 2026 Wellcome narrows this to the UK plus LMICs in Africa, South Asia and South-east Asia, check the scheme page before planning an application from elsewhere.
+What career stage fits the Early-Career Award?
Post-PhD researchers with up to around 3 years of postdoctoral research experience at the deadline, with allowances for part-time work, career breaks, Covid disruption, and discipline changes. You are not eligible if you already hold a tenured research post (unless LMIC-based) or an equivalent career-stage award.
+How competitive is Wellcome funding?
In Wellcome's published 2023/24 funding data, 611 of 2,774 applications were funded. Success ran at 19.2% for UK-based applicants, 7.8% for other high-income countries, and 8.3% for LMIC-based applicants.
+Can I resubmit after a rejection?
Yes, one further application for the same project is allowed, provided it has significant changes. You do not need Wellcome's permission first, but you cannot have two applications to the same scheme pending at once.
+What are Wellcome's open access rules?
Research articles from Wellcome funding must be freely available through PubMed Central / Europe PMC at publication under a CC-BY licence. Open access charges are handled via the organisational block grant where your institution holds one.
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