Funding Opportunities

There are no tuition fees for doing a doctorate at KIT. To cover your expenses during your research phase there are several possibilities available to you. Generally, a doctorate is financed by a job as a research assistant at KIT, or by means of a scholarship.

It is not unusual to finance your doctorate through several different sources. The fewest of doctoral researchers in Germany only receive one form of financing during their research phase.

The following page will give you an overview of the most common funding options.

Finanzspritze_neu.jpg Marina Lohrbach - Fotolia

A position as research assistant is the most common way of financing your doctorate and also offers you the opportunity of collecting extensive professional experience both in terms of research and teaching.

▶ Here you can find job opportunities for doctoral researchers at KIT (see: "Akademische Mitarbeiter/Ingenieure (Master) (m/w/d)" und/oder "Doktoranden (m/w/d)"). Please be aware that generally there are not many open positions offered on the websites. If there is no suitable position offered, please contact a potential supervisor. Further information about searching for a potential supervisor will be ▶ here (step 1).

It is a vital concern to the KIT executive board, the KIT Senate and the staff council to offer a good work environment to those employed at KIT. For that reason, the executive board, senate and staff council have decided on the voluntary agreement ▶Good Work at KIT.

Working for a company or an extramural research institution offers you an additional possibility of financing your doctorate. In those cases you are generally employed directly by the company or research institution. You will write your dissertation during or outside of your working hours, depending on what has been agreed on.

You can find networking opportunities with potentially relevant companies during events such as ▶ Company meets Campus, organized by ▶ KIT-Career-Service.

If you are doing your doctorate within a structured doctoral program, you are generally being financed by an employment contract or a doctoral scholarship of the respective program.

Please note that there are different types of programs: Graduate Schools, Research Training Groups, and PhD programs. You can find a list of the KIT doctoral programs ▶ here.

The specific programs all have their own prerequisites. Please read the information on the respective website or contact the responsible persons listed there.

KIT supports PhD projects under the “▶ Landesgraduiertenförderungsgesetz” (Graduate Funding from the German States) with full scholarships. However, you will have to be accepted as a doctoral researcher at the respective KIT Department to be eligible to apply.

▶ Here you can find more detailed information about the funding opportunities of the Graduate Funding from the German States as well as the current application deadlines.

A huge number of foundations and organizations offer funding for junior scientists during the course of their scientific career. We would like to offer you a current overview of the different funding options. We regularly update the database and send e-mails containing information on some of the programs to all of those who have registered for the KHYS network.

Please click on the target group to find the grant or funding option that may suit your needs!

▶ Funding for doctoral researchers
▶ Special programs for women
▶ Research travel and visiting researchers scholarships
▶ Grants for material and travel expenses

For ease of reference, the relevant foundations and organizations have been arranged in alphabetical order.

The following databases might help you to find various funding possibilities:

▶ Online network for scholarships and career – e-fellows
▶ DFG – Funding Programmes
▶ Study Support – MyStipendium (only available in German)
▶ EU Scholarship Portal
▶ Kisswin – information and consulting for academic careers
▶ DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service)
▶ Euraxess database
▶ FIT (Scholarships and various other funding measures, only available in German)
▶ Deutsches Informationszentrum Kulturförderung (Funding for Humanities)
▶ Association of German Foundations (mostly non-academic, search engine only in German)

KHYS offers you several different ways of financial support for initializing and deepening international contacts. Click ▶ here to find more information.

You have already achieved a lot? Prizes and awards honor and reward your accomplishments and your dedication.

Every year, KIT rewards three outstanding doctoral researchers at KIT with the ▶ KIT Doctoral Award. With this, KIT intends to highlight the high relevance of the young scientists being a role model for others.

▶ Here you can also find an overview over different prizes and awards for doctoral researchers and dissertations by external institutions.

In the course of the restrictions currently implemented due to the coronavirus pandemic, there are sometimes considerable delays in completing doctorates. In order to support doctoral researchers during this challenging time and to enable a successful completion, KHYS has set up an Emergency Fund to Support the Conclusion of the Doctorate. Click ▶ here to find more information.