PhD Fellowship fundamental research

• You must be affiliated to a university in the Flemish Community, the Evangelical Theological Faculty in Leuven or the Faculty of Protestant Theology in Brussels.
• At the start of the fellowship, you must hold a degree that is at least equivalent to a Master's degree that follows a Bachelor's degree and has been awarded by the competent institutions of one of the countries of the EEA or Switzerland.
• If you have a degree certificate issued within the EEA or Switzerland but other than a master’s degree OR you have a degree certificate issued outside the EEA and Switzerland (this also applies to degrees awarded in the UK), then you must obtain one of the following documents at the start of the fellowship:
• An attestation of NARIC-Vlaanderen that proves your degree is equivalent to the level of a master’s degree awarded by one of the Flemish universities.
• (Or) A declaration in which the administration of the university in the Flemish Community confirms that you will be allowed to prepare a doctoral thesis.
• The time span between your Master's degree or equivalent and 01 March 2026 may not be longer than three years.
• You may have a maximum of 18 months of scientific seniority on 1 March 2026.
• You can only apply twice for a PhD fellowship.
• You have not yet benefited from this fellowship, not even in part.
• You agree to the scientific integrity clause.

Every year, the FWO provides more information about the new PhD fellowship call during info sessions at the universities. Registration for one of these info sessions can be done through the universities. If you cannot attend the information session, you can consult the presentation. A separate video on how to successfully complete the application form is available here. The FWO offers two types of PhD fellowships. To help you make the right choice, the FWO has developed a short video. You can watch it here.

The criteria that panel members will use during the evaluation of your PhD fundamental research application in the preselection and in the interview for the call 2026 can be found hereunder.

In the application forms, you need to specify a percentile. How to do that is explained in the document below.

Study narrative: The application form pays attention to a qualitative description of the completed study pathway. In the relevant section, applicants should set out why, based on their study pathway, they would be an excellent candidate to engage in cutting-edge research through their proposed PhD project. Applicants may, for example, refer to study results, awards, diplomas or specific courses. This qualitative approach should allow for a broader assessment of the candidate than merely based on study results or percentiles.

Provide us with your diverse researcher profile: The FWO gives ample consideration to diverse researcher profiles and research output in the application forms. It thereby gives researchers the opportunity to demonstrate the construction of their research careers through a range of scientifically relevant activities, skills, experiences and achievements. This is in line with the international evolution away from a one-sided focus on classical output criteria (such as publications, bibliometrics, patents, etc.) and towards a broader view of what science can be and achieve, while respecting the specificity of each discipline. The application forms are supposed to help the researcher demonstrate that versatility. The FWO instructs the panel members to take this into account in the evaluation of your application.

State any obstacles in your research: We recognise within the FWO any possible impact or event that hampered your research or achievements. We encourage you to indicate such impacts in the application form under the career breaks and motivation statement sections.

After preselection, we will notify candidates of the results of the preselection. You can find interview dates, information about our interview rooms and an update of the interview guidelines below.