The SNSF Starting Grant is the Swiss National Science Foundation’s flagship funding instrument for early-career researchers who want to establish an independent research group in Switzerland. It funds up to five years of project costs, including the applicant’s own salary, and requires the applicant to be hosted at a Swiss university or research institution for the duration of the grant. This guide covers who is eligible, how much the grant is worth, what a host institution must provide, and how the scheme now relates to the European Research Council’s (ERC) Starting Grant now that Switzerland is fully associated to Horizon Europe again.
What the SNSF Starting Grant is, and who runs it
The Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) is Switzerland’s principal national funding agency for basic, investigator-driven research across all disciplines. The Starting Grant is one of SNSF’s career-stage-specific instruments, sitting between postdoctoral funding and the more senior SNSF Advanced Grant in the funding pathway. Its purpose is narrow and specific: it funds a researcher’s transition into leading their own independent research group, not an already-established professor’s ongoing programme and not a postdoctoral fellowship carried out under someone else’s supervision.
SNSF publishes a dedicated call document each year on snf.ch with the exact submission deadline, and the current eligibility rules and figures below reflect that published guidance; always check the live call document for the year an applicant intends to submit, since deadlines and minor rule details are set annually.
Eligibility: the post-PhD window and the Swiss-link requirement
Two separate eligibility tests apply, and an applicant must clear both.
- Career-stage window. Applicants must fall within an eligibility window measured from the date of their doctoral defense (or equivalent qualification, or medical degree) to the call’s submission deadline — published guidance sets this at roughly two to eight years post-doctorate. Extensions to this window are possible for documented career interruptions (e.g. parental leave, illness, clinical training) under SNSF’s General Implementation Regulations. Applicants must not already have achieved the objective the grant is meant to fund: someone already leading their own research group of more than roughly 2–3 people, or holding a position with significant secured independent funding at the deadline, is not eligible.
- Swiss-link requirement. Applicants must demonstrate a substantive prior connection to the Swiss research system — specifically, the equivalent of at least two years of research work at a minimum of 80% (0.8 FTE) average work time carried out in Switzerland. SNSF applies this requirement without exception; a strong CV elsewhere does not substitute for it. This is what distinguishes the SNSF Starting Grant from the ERC Starting Grant, which is open to researchers of any nationality or prior institutional history, evaluated on the strength of the proposal rather than on any link to the host country.
Both a doctorate (or equivalent/medical degree) and the Swiss-link requirement are threshold conditions checked before scientific evaluation begins, not factors weighed against the quality of the research proposal.
Funding amount and duration
An SNSF Starting Grant provides up to CHF 1 million in project funding over a maximum duration of five years; for a shorter approved duration, the maximum budget is reduced pro rata temporis. Within that envelope, applicants can also request funds to cover their own salary, set at the level appropriate to their host-institution position (assistant professor or group leader — see host institution requirements below), rather than having to fund their own position from a separate source. SNSF also earmarks additional budget specifically to support outstanding applications from women, reflecting a broader gender-equity emphasis that runs across SNSF’s career-funding schemes.
The CHF 1 million figure and five-year maximum are the headline numbers in SNSF’s own published guidance; an applicant’s actual awarded budget depends on the scope and cost structure of the proposed project and is set through the review process, not automatically granted at the ceiling.
Host institution requirements
Unlike a portable fellowship that a researcher can take to any employer, the SNSF Starting Grant is tied to a specific commitment from a Swiss host institution, confirmed before or during the application:
- Universities must offer the applicant at least an assistant professorship position and title for the full duration of the grant.
- Other eligible research institutions (e.g. non-university research institutes) must instead offer a group leader position with genuine independent responsibility for the project and its management — not a position embedded under another investigator’s authority.
In both cases, the institution must be based in Switzerland. This host-institution rule is the mechanism that makes the Starting Grant a genuinely Switzerland-anchoring instrument: it is designed to convert a successful early-career researcher, wherever they trained, into an independent group leader at a Swiss institution, and the institutional commitment has to be real and durable, not a nominal affiliation arranged only to satisfy the application.
How the Starting Grant fits Switzerland’s Horizon Europe association status
This is the part of the SNSF Starting Grant’s history that changes depending on when you’re reading about it, so it is worth stating plainly what the current status is rather than assuming the older story still holds.
Switzerland was excluded from full association to Horizon Europe for an extended period after 2021, over an unrelated Swiss–EU institutional framework dispute. During that exclusion, Swiss-based researchers could not be funded as ERC grant holders through the normal Horizon Europe route, and SNSF ran its Starting Grant (and the equivalent Advanced Grant, and a Consolidator-stage instrument) explicitly as transitional national substitute funding — a way to keep supporting the same career stage and roughly the same scale of award that the ERC would otherwise have funded, so that Swiss research careers weren’t disrupted by a political dispute they had no part in.
That situation has since changed. Switzerland and the European Commission signed the EU Programmes Agreement (EUPA) on 10 November 2025, restoring full Swiss association to Horizon Europe (and Euratom and the Digital Europe Programme), applied with retroactive effect from 1 January 2025. With full association restored, Swiss institutions are once again eligible host institutions for ERC grants — including the ERC Starting Grant — and mono-beneficiary Horizon Europe instruments (ERC, EIC, MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships) are open to Swiss-based applicants on the same terms as researchers in EU member states and other associated countries.
SNSF has confirmed that, with the transitional need gone, it is continuing the SNSF Starting Grant as a standalone national funding scheme in its own right, rather than as an ERC substitute. In practice this means two related but distinct pathways now coexist for an eligible early-career researcher based in Switzerland: the SNSF Starting Grant (a national scheme, with the Swiss-link eligibility requirement described above) and the ERC Starting Grant (funded through Horizon Europe, open regardless of nationality or institutional history, evaluated by the European Research Council). SNSF’s own guidance permits an applicant to pursue an ERC Starting Grant application in parallel with an SNSF Starting Grant application; a research office advising an early-career PI should treat the two as complementary options to weigh against each other, not as mutually exclusive or as one simply replacing the other.
SNSF Starting Grant vs. ERC Starting Grant, in brief
| Dimension | SNSF Starting Grant | ERC Starting Grant |
|---|---|---|
| Funder | Swiss National Science Foundation (national) | European Research Council, via Horizon Europe |
| Eligibility basis | Career stage plus a required prior link to the Swiss research system | Career stage plus host institution located in an EU member state or Horizon Europe associated country — open to applicants of any nationality or prior history |
| Host location | Must be a Swiss institution | Any EU member state or Horizon Europe associated country, including Switzerland since full re-association |
| Relationship today | Standalone national scheme | Standalone EU-level scheme — the two are no longer positioned as substitutes for one another |
Applying: where to start
SNSF publishes a new call document for the Starting Grant each year on the SNSF Starting Grants programme page, with the current submission deadline, any year-specific adjustments to the eligibility window, and the required application components. Because the host-institution commitment (assistant professorship or group leader position) has to be arranged before or during the application, prospective applicants should engage their target Swiss institution’s research office early — most Swiss universities’ grants offices (for example ETH Zurich’s and EPFL’s) publish their own guidance pages summarising the scheme and internal deadlines ahead of the SNSF deadline itself.
Frequently asked questions
How many years after my PhD can I apply for an SNSF Starting Grant?
SNSF’s published eligibility window is approximately two to eight years after the doctoral defense (or equivalent/medical degree), with documented extensions available for qualifying career interruptions. Check the current year’s call document for the exact window, since it is defined relative to that year’s submission deadline.
Do I need to already be working in Switzerland to apply?
You need the equivalent of at least two years of research work at 80% time or more carried out in Switzerland at some point in your career — this is applied without exception. You do not need to be currently employed in Switzerland at the moment you apply, but the required prior Swiss research experience must already exist.
Is the SNSF Starting Grant still a substitute for the ERC Starting Grant?
No, not since Switzerland’s full re-association to Horizon Europe (retroactive to 1 January 2025, formalised by the EU Programmes Agreement signed 10 November 2025). SNSF now runs the Starting Grant as a standalone national scheme, and Swiss institutions are again eligible ERC host institutions, so the two schemes operate in parallel rather than one replacing the other.
Can I apply for both an SNSF Starting Grant and an ERC Starting Grant?
SNSF’s guidance permits a parallel ERC Starting Grant application. Because eligibility criteria and evaluation bodies differ, a research office should treat these as two separate applications to plan and budget for, not a single combined submission.
How much salary support can the grant cover?
Within the overall CHF 1 million project budget, applicants may request funding for their own salary at a level tied to their host-institution position — assistant professor or group leader, depending on host institution type — rather than needing a separate salary source.
