Open Call 2026
The COST Association has updated its landing page for the Open Call in 2026. It may be useful for those interested in the Open Call to bookmark this page and check it regularly for any further updates.
The COST Association states that it will be streamlining its proposal submission, evaluation, selection and approval (SESA) procedure and that all relevant documents will be available in Spring 2026.
We also await the publication of the COST Info Day date in 2026. Last year over 1000 participants joined online!
COST Open Call 2026 will be open in Summer 2026, with a submission deadline in Autumn 2026 – usually in October, but watch this space! In Open Call 2026 the COST Association expects to fund up to 70 COST Actions.
Open Call 2025
COST Actions from the 2025 Open Call are going through evaluation and review stages. We would usually expect successful proposals to be announced in May 2026.
The UK was the second highest performing nation in COST in the Open Call 2025, just behind Italy (110) and ahead of Spain (96) in terms of submitted proposals with a main proposer. The UK had more main proposers in 2025 (109) than in 2024 (82).
In terms of submitted proposals, 55% of all proposals have two or more main OECD fields of science represented within the proposal.
Among main proposers one quarter are younger researchers (under 40), over one third of main proposers are affiliated to institutions in Inclusiveness Target Countries (ITC) within COST and just under two thirds are based in non-ITCs. Gender balance stands at 52% male and 48% female.
Please see our COST factsheet for current information on the SESA process.