Scholarships in Germany 2026 for International Students

Three kinds of funder account for nearly everything on this list, and they look for different people.

The DAAD. The DAAD Scholarship is the programme most applicants start with, and many universities run their own DAAD-funded awards on top of it, such as the development-related EPOS courses at Freie Universität Berlin and the University of Freiburg. Many DAAD programmes need two applications in parallel: one to the university for the place, one to the DAAD for the money.

The foundations. The Heinrich Böll Foundation, the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, the Konrad Adenauer Foundation and the Catholic KAAD each look for engagement as well as grades: the Konrad Adenauer Foundation names civic engagement and leadership, and KAAD usually asks for a Christian affiliation or a willingness to take part in interfaith dialogue.

States and universities. BAYHOST funds graduates from Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe in Bavaria, and schools such as TU Munich and the Hertie School in Berlin fund places on their own programmes.

39 of these awards fund a master's degree. The DAAD rate on its own scholarship page is €992 a month, and the same figure appears on the Helmut-Schmidt programme for public policy and governance and on the BAYHOST award. The EPOS programmes are the strictest about background: a bachelor's degree of at least four years, two years of relevant work experience, and an intention to return home to work in development.

For a specific field: Heidelberg's MSc International Health, the Hertie School's Data for Good and Future of Europe scholarships, and the Leipzig DAAD-SEPT MBA scholarship for business. Economics and business graduates have their own DAAD study scholarship.

30 awards fund doctoral study. Monthly rates on their own pages run from €1,200 at the University of Hamburg to €1,400 for the DAAD Doctoral Scholarships, which also list a yearly research allowance. If you want to keep a supervisor at home, the DAAD Cotutelle programme funds a doctorate supervised by two universities.

Graduate schools fund their own cohorts too: BerGSAS in Berlin and the University of Münster. After the doctorate, the Humboldt Research Fellowship pays €3,000 a month to postdoctoral researchers who bring their own project and a German host.

Only 11 awards here mention bachelor's study, and most of them are not for a first-year student applying from abroad. The Friedrich Ebert Foundation asks for admission to, or enrolment at, a German university and for German language skills; it lists €934 a month for bachelor's students. The Konrad Adenauer Foundation takes bachelor's applicants only after two semesters in Germany. The realistic route is to start the degree first and apply to a foundation once you are enrolled.

No award on this page is reserved for one country. What decides it is the eligibility line on each award: 42 say they are open to all nationalities, and 11 are aimed at students from developing or emerging countries, which is where the EPOS courses and KAAD sit. For those, check the country list linked from the award page before you start writing.

The other requirement that rules people out is language. The Konrad Adenauer Foundation asks for German at B2 level and the Friedrich Ebert Foundation for good German, while DAAD awards for English-taught courses take IELTS or TOEFL and pay for a German course before or during the degree.

The next dated deadlines among these awards:

• Humboldt Research Fellowship for Postdoctoral Researchers - 15 November 2026
• beVisioneers Mercedes-Benz Fellowship - 31 January 2027

Many awards on the list run on the university's own admission timetable instead of a single date; their pages say so.