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Short answer: TETFund runs several separate portals and they do not share a login. For a National Research Fund (NRF) grant application, the portal is nrf.tetfund.gov.ng. Nothing else. TERAS at teras.ng is for institutional interventions and will not accept your research proposal. If your NRF password does not work, it is usually because you are trying it on the wrong portal.
This page sets out which TETFund portal does what, how to get an NRF account, how the grant cycle runs from concept note to award, and what the money limits actually are.
Which TETFund portal am I supposed to be on?
This is the single biggest source of confusion, and it is TETFund’s fault rather than yours — there are at least four systems with similar branding.
| Portal | What it is for | Who logs in |
|---|---|---|
nrf.tetfund.gov.ng |
National Research Fund grant applications — concept notes and full proposals | Individual researchers: Principal Investigators and team researchers |
teras.ng |
TERAS — Tertiary Education, Research, Applications & Services. Institutional interventions and the central repository | Institutional beneficiary staff, via BIMS credentials |
impact.tetfund.gov.ng |
TETFund Impact assessment participation | Staff invited to impact assessments |
tetfund.gov.ng |
The main public website — guidelines, news, intervention documents | No login needed |
TERAS itself carries a notice telling people that for National Research Fund submissions they should use the NRF portal instead. That notice exists because so many applicants land there first.
One more trap: some older TETFund circulars and university notices refer to the NRF portal as nrftetfund.gov.ng, without the dot after “nrf”. The working address is nrf.tetfund.gov.ng. If you have typed the address from a printed circular and reached nothing, this is likely why.
Getting an NRF account
The NRF platform has two separate sign-in routes on its home page, and picking the wrong one is the second most common access problem.
- Principal Investigator sign-in — for the researcher who leads the project and owns the application.
- Researcher sign-in — for team members attached to a PI’s project.
If you are starting a new application, you register as a New Principal Investigator using the “Create Account” link, not as a researcher. Team members are added to the project afterwards; they should not each create PI accounts for the same project.
Before you register, download the guidance the portal publishes on its own front page — the PI User Guide, the Research Brief and the Proposal Guidelines. These are the documents the screening committee actually assesses against, and they are free to download without logging in.
For account and technical problems, the support address is [email protected]. Regional NRF desks also operate as [email protected] and [email protected].
If the portal is simply not working
Do not assume the problem is your credentials. The NRF portal has a documented history of buckling under deadline load: TETFund extended the concept-note deadline for the 2025 grant cycle to Thursday 11 September 2025, and universities circulating that extension attributed it explicitly to challenges experienced with the NRF Portal.
The practical lesson is to submit early in the window rather than in the final days, and to tell your research office promptly if the portal is failing — institutional escalation is what produces extensions.
NRF or IBR? Two different pots of money
TETFund runs two research funding streams and they are not alternatives you choose between casually. They differ by an order of magnitude.
| National Research Fund (NRF) | Institution Based Research (IBR) | |
|---|---|---|
| Funding limit per project | N50,000,000 | N2,000,000 maximum |
| Who administers it | TETFund centrally, through the National Research Fund Committee | Your own institution |
| Where you apply | nrf.tetfund.gov.ng |
Your institution’s research office |
| Purpose | Cutting-edge research relevant to critical sectors of the national economy | Institution-level research activity |
These ceilings are the figures published by university TETFund research offices. Grant ceilings are revised between cycles, so confirm the current limit in the guidelines for the cycle you are applying to before you build a budget around N50 million.
Who is eligible to apply for NRF
- You must be a lecturer in a Nigerian public university, polytechnic or college of education.
- The Principal Investigator should preferably be of professorial rank in a university, or chief lecturer in a polytechnic or college of education.
- Your research team may be broader than your institution. Team members may come from private tertiary institutions, research institutes, Centres of Excellence and industry.
That last point is underused. The PI must sit in a public institution, but the collaboration around them does not have to. Multidisciplinary teams are explicitly encouraged, and university circulars for the 2025 cycle went out of their way to welcome early-career researchers and mentees onto teams.
How the grant cycle runs
NRF is a staged competition, not a single application. Understanding the stages tells you where to put your effort.
- Concept note. You submit a short concept note through the NRF portal during an announced window. This is the stage most applicants are eliminated at, and the stage with the hard deadline.
- Screening. The National Research Fund Screening and Monitoring Committee (NRFS&MC) evaluates the concept notes.
- Full proposal. Successful applicants are invited to submit a full proposal.
- Defence. Shortlisted teams defend their proposal before the NRFS&MC in person. Budget your time for this — it is a real gate, not a formality.
- Approval. TETFund’s Board of Trustees gives final approval to the awards.
Route through your Research Management Office
Nigerian universities generally require NRF applications to go through the institution’s Research Management Office (RMO) or equivalent research directorate. The RMO handles proposal development support and compliance with TETFund procedures, and is the body that will escalate portal problems on your behalf.
Contact your RMO before the window opens, not in the last week. They usually hold the current cycle’s circular before it reaches individual academics.
Thematic areas
NRF calls are organised around prioritised thematic areas. For the 2025 cycle, universities circulated three eligible categories:
- Humanities and Social Sciences (HSS)
- Science, Engineering, Technology and Innovation (SETI)
- Cross-Cutting — including the Blue Economy, Artificial Intelligence, Renewable Energy and the National System of Innovation
TETFund has previously published a longer breakdown of 28 prioritised thematic areas under these same three headings, covering agriculture, health, energy, governance and environmental sustainability. The headline categories have been stable; the sub-areas move between cycles. Read the current cycle’s circular for the list that will actually be scored.
What the fund has awarded
For a sense of scale and competitiveness, TETFund’s published figures for earlier cycles:
| Cycle | Amount | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| 2019 | N3.9 billion | Supported 128 research projects |
| 2020 | N7.5 billion | Concept notes accepted 22 June to 21 July 2020 |
We have not been able to verify published award totals for the most recent cycles, so treat these as historical scale rather than a current budget.
Questions people actually ask
My NRF TETFund login is not working. What now?
Check three things in order. First, that you are on nrf.tetfund.gov.ng and not TERAS or the impact portal. Second, that you are using the correct sign-in box — Principal Investigator and Researcher are separate routes. Third, use the “Forgot password?” link on the NRF portal itself. If all three fail, mail [email protected] and copy your RMO.
Is the TERAS login the same as the NRF login?
No. TERAS uses BIMS credentials and serves institutional interventions. NRF grant applications use their own accounts on the NRF portal. Having one does not give you the other.
Can I apply if I am not a professor?
You can be on a team. To be the Principal Investigator, professorial rank in a university or chief lecturer status in a polytechnic or college of education is the stated preference. Early-career researchers are encouraged to join teams led by a qualifying PI.
Can someone from a private university apply?
Not as the Principal Investigator. The PI must be a lecturer in a public tertiary institution. Researchers from private institutions, research institutes and industry can be team members.
What is the current deadline?
We are not publishing a current deadline, because NRF cycle dates are announced by circular and have been extended mid-cycle before. The 2025 concept-note deadline was extended to 11 September 2025. Get the live date from the NRF portal or your Research Management Office — not from a secondary source, including this one.
How much can I ask for?
Published university guidance puts the NRF ceiling at N50,000,000 per project, against N2,000,000 for Institution Based Research. Confirm against your cycle’s guidelines before budgeting.
Related reading
For the wider picture of how TETFund is funded and what else it pays for, see our guide to TETFund’s role in Nigerian research funding. For how Nigerian universities and their programmes are regulated, see Nigeria’s National Universities Commission (NUC). If your project involves commercialising results, Nigeria’s NIPPS and university technology transfer covers the route from grant to intellectual property.
