The French Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR) and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) are continuing their annual joint calls for French-German projects in the Natural, Life and Engineering Sciences. This is based on an agreement signed by both agencies, which was confirmed by the DFG’s Joint Committee (“Hauptausschuss”), establishing joint French-German projects as a standard offering within the DFG’s research grants programme.

For the 2026 edition of this call, the DFG will act as the lead agency, i. e., joint (full) proposals describing the bilateral projects as a whole have to be submitted in a first step to the DFG, which will be responsible for processing them and conducting the review process. The ANR will require a copy of the documents to be submitted on its dedicated web portal. Note that there is no pre-proposal stage on either side.

Submission of full proposals for joint bilateral research projects is possible electronically via DFG’s elan portal(externer Link) starting 17 November 2025 and at latest on 14 January 2026 (until midnight). In order to submit, all applicants on the German side need an active account on elan with up-to-date contact information. If this is not the case, please set up or update your account as early as possible, at the latest on 7 January 2026.

The corresponding submission to the ANR, using the exact same acronym and identical proposal documents, is required before 15 January 2026 at 5 p.m. on the ANR’s submission website, where administrative and financial data relevant for the ANR have to be entered. Please refer to the ANR’s website(externer Link) for details, notably to the generic call for proposals 2026 page and the specific ANR-DFG annex.

Please note that proposals in the social sciences and humanities must be submitted in the dedicated ANR-DFG call in the social sciences and humanities (with different deadlines). This also applies to transdisciplinary projects when the proposed research approach mainly centres on these fields, and/or when the principal investigator is from the social sciences/humanities.

Please be aware that:

• DFG’s dedicated webpage(interner Link) for this call provides more ample information with regular updates.
• In particular, there you find a template for these joint proposals, which are to be written in English.
• The respective eligibility rules of ANR and DFG apply to the applicants of a joint proposal.
• Commercial partners cannot be involved in joint ANR-DFG projects.
• The duration of the projects can be up to three years.
• Decisions can be expected in October 2026. Funding will start with the beginning of 2027.

The results of the 2025 edition will also be available through the DFG’s dedicated webpage (to be expected in October).

Equity and Diversity

The DFG strongly welcomes proposals from researchers of all genders and sexual identities, from different ethnic, cultural, religious, ideological or social backgrounds, from different career stages, types of universities and research institutions, and with disabilities or chronic illness. 

Good Research Practice

According to a resolution of the DFG General Assembly, DFG funding may only be awarded to research institutions that have implemented the guidelines laid down in the Code of Conduct for Safeguarding Good Research Practice(externer Link) in their own regulations. The management of your institution is responsible for implementing the guidelines in a legally binding manner. In order to avoid delays in the disbursement of funding, please verify implementation within your institution in good time. For information regarding the implementation, please refer to the Research Integrity Portal(externer Link). If you have any questions on this subject, please contact the Research Integrity team(externer Link) at the DFG Head Office. 

Further Information 

Please find detailed information on ANR-DFG 2026 NLE here(interner Link).

Contact Persons at the DFG Head Office 

General questions about ANR-DFG NLE:

Dr. Carsten Balleier, 0228-885 2063, Anr-nle@dfg.de(externer Link) 

Maria Borre, 0228-885 2715, Anr-nle@dfg.de(externer Link)

Christina López Castillo, 0228-885 2295, Anr-nle@dfg.de(externer Link)

Questions specific to your research discipline:

Here(interner Link) you can find the Programme Contacts at the DFG Head Office.

Privacy Policy

We, the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation), take the protection of your personal data and its confidential treatment extremely seriously. Therefore, please refer to the DFG’s Privacy Policy(interner Link). If you intend to transmit personal data of third parties, please make sure to do so only if the necessary legitimation under data protection law exist. Before transmitting data of third parties to the DFG, please forward the DFG’s Data Protection Notice to the individuals affected (data subjects). If there is a legitimate interest not to inform individuals beforehand (e.g. for reasons of secrecy or in case of a nomination or candidate proposal), these individuals should be informed no later than at the time of publication.