Innovate UK Smart Grants is one of the best-known routes into UK innovation funding, so it is a natural search target — but as of this writing the scheme is paused, not open for applications. This guide explains what Smart Grants normally funded, why Innovate UK paused the scheme in January 2025, what has replaced or supplemented it since, and where to look instead if you need funding now.
Current status: paused since January 2025
Innovate UK (part of UK Research and Innovation, UKRI) paused new Smart Grants competitions from January 2025. UKRI’s own guidance for the scheme states that Innovate UK is “pausing Smart Grants to develop tailored support,” with newer, more targeted pilot programmes launching in its place. There has been no announcement of Smart Grants reopening in its previous form as of this writing.
Because this status has already changed once (from open, to paused, with interim pilots layered on top) and can change again, treat any specific date claim — including this one — as something to re-check before you plan around it. The authoritative source is Innovate UK’s own guidance page, not third-party funding-advisory sites, however well-informed those sites are.
- Check current status directly: UKRI’s Smart Grants guidance page on ukri.org.
- Check live, open competitions: the Innovation Funding Service competition finder, which lists every currently open Innovate UK opportunity, not just Smart Grants.
What Smart Grants normally fund
When open, Smart Grants funded single or collaborative UK business-led projects developing game-changing and disruptive innovations capable of significantly impacting the UK economy. The defining features of the scheme, as run before the January 2025 pause, were:
- Sector-agnostic. Unlike many Innovate UK competitions tied to a specific technology theme (e.g. net zero, health, defence), Smart Grants was open to any sector — the bar was the scale and novelty of the innovation, not the industry.
- Business-led. A UK-registered business had to lead the application, whether applying alone or in collaboration with other businesses and research organisations.
- Commercial route to market required. Applicants had to show a credible route to commercialisation and a case for significant economic return to the UK, not just technical novelty.
- Staged by project size and duration. Historically the competition ran in strands for different project lengths and grant sizes, from smaller, shorter feasibility-style projects up to larger, longer industrial research and experimental development projects.
In short, Smart Grants functioned as Innovate UK’s general-purpose, cross-sector door for ambitious, high-risk innovation projects that did not fit neatly into a themed competition. That is precisely why its pause left a visible gap — there was no single like-for-like replacement route for applicants whose project did not map onto one of Innovate UK’s sector-specific calls.
Why Innovate UK paused the scheme
Per UKRI’s own guidance, the stated reason is a redesign of Innovate UK’s funding offer to better fit the needs of innovative businesses and to align with the UK Government’s Industrial Strategy, which concentrates public investment in specific growth sectors rather than funding innovation generically across all sectors. Reporting from UK innovation-funding advisers has consistently framed the pause the same way: not a budget cut announced in isolation, but a deliberate shift away from a broad, sector-agnostic grant toward more targeted programmes tied to strategic priorities and paired with non-grant support (investment facilitation, business advice) rather than grant funding alone.
This matters for applicants because it signals the direction of travel: even if a Smart-Grants-shaped scheme returns, it is more likely to arrive narrower in scope (tied to Industrial Strategy growth sectors) and blended with other support types, rather than as a straightforward reinstatement of the old cross-sector grant.
What Innovate UK has offered instead
While Smart Grants has been paused, Innovate UK has not stopped funding innovation — funding has shifted into other, more targeted routes. The most significant of these is Growth Catalyst, an integrated package of grant funding, aligned private investment, and business support aimed at helping high-potential start-ups scale, with a funding commitment reported at up to £130 million for 2025–2026. Growth Catalyst runs as more than one strand rather than a single competition, including:
- Investor Partnerships — grant funding for UK-registered micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises made available alongside private investment from selected investor partners, intended to de-risk and accelerate follow-on private funding rather than replace it.
- Early Stage: New Innovators — funding for UK-registered micro and small businesses developing early-stage innovations in a defined set of critical technology areas.
Beyond Growth Catalyst, Innovate UK continues to run its normal rolling programme of sector- and technology-specific competitions (for example in areas such as net zero, health technologies, and defence and security) through the Innovation Funding Service, plus non-grant business support such as advisory and investor-readiness services. None of these is a direct substitute for Smart Grants’ sector-agnostic scope, but together they are the practical routes available to a UK innovation-led business or research organisation seeking Innovate UK funding right now.
Because competitions open and close on a rolling basis, the only reliable way to know what is currently fundable is to search the Innovation Funding Service directly for open competitions, rather than relying on a static list (including this one) that can go stale within weeks.
What this means for research administrators and applicants
- Don’t build a proposal timeline around a Smart Grants deadline that doesn’t currently exist. If a funding plan or proposal pipeline still assumes a Smart Grants round, revisit it against the live competition finder before committing staff time.
- Re-scope for a themed route where possible. Because current Innovate UK funding leans toward Industrial Strategy growth sectors and sector-specific competitions, a project that was framed generically for Smart Grants may need reframing against a specific sector or technology call to be competitive under the current funding landscape.
- Treat blended funding (grant plus investment) as the norm, not the exception, for scale-up-stage projects. Growth Catalyst’s Investor Partnerships strand pairs grant funding with private investment by design — earlier-stage or investment-averse applicants should check eligibility carefully rather than assume a pure-grant route is available.
- Keep monitoring, don’t assume permanence. A pause is explicitly framed by Innovate UK as a redesign, not a cancellation. Institutions with a standing interest in Smart-Grants-shaped funding should build a periodic check of UKRI’s guidance page into their funding-horizon-scanning process.
Frequently asked questions
Is Innovate UK Smart Grants still paused?
As of this writing, yes — Innovate UK paused new Smart Grants competitions from January 2025 as part of a redesign of its funding offer, and no reinstatement of the scheme in its previous form has been announced. Status can change; verify directly against UKRI’s Smart Grants guidance page before relying on this.
Why did Innovate UK pause Smart Grants?
Innovate UK’s stated reason is to redevelop tailored support for innovative businesses and to align its funding offer more closely with the UK Government’s Industrial Strategy, which prioritises specific growth sectors over sector-agnostic funding.
What can I apply for instead of Smart Grants right now?
The closest current equivalents are Innovate UK’s Growth Catalyst strands (Investor Partnerships and Early Stage: New Innovators), plus Innovate UK’s ongoing sector- and technology-specific competitions run through the Innovation Funding Service. Which is the best fit depends on your project’s stage, sector, and whether you can accept blended grant-plus-investment funding.
Will Smart Grants come back?
Innovate UK has described the pause as a redesign rather than a cancellation, and has already introduced interim and pilot programmes in the meantime. There is no confirmed date to reinstate Smart Grants in its previous, sector-agnostic form; any future version is more likely to be narrower in scope and tied to Industrial Strategy priorities than the original scheme.
Where do I check for live Innovate UK funding competitions?
The Innovation Funding Service competition search is the authoritative, continuously updated list of everything currently open. For background on how Innovate UK fits within the wider UKRI structure, see CASRAI’s guide to how the nine UKRI councils and Funding Service fit together.
This page reflects Smart Grants’ status as verified against UKRI’s own guidance at the time of publication. Because Innovate UK’s funding offer is under active redesign, treat any specific status or programme name here as a starting point for your own check against ukri.org and the Innovation Funding Service, not a substitute for it.
