By Vedat Mizrahi, Co-founder · 22 June 2026

Grants with no deadline: UK funders you can apply to any time (June 2026): and the ones that only look open

"Rolling" is one of the most misleading words in grant funding. A directory tags a programme "rolling, no deadline" and leaves it there for a year, but some of those funds open in fixed rounds, some have quietly closed because the money ran out, and some never took open applications at all. I'm Vedat Mizrahi, co-founder of GrantNest. In the week up to 21 June 2026 we re-checked the main UK funders on their own websites. Here are the ones you genuinely can apply to at any time right now, and, just as usefully, the "rolling" funds that are actually shut today.

Genuinely open, any time: verified on the funder's own page

1. The National Lottery Community Fund: England (UK-wide variants too)

The largest open door for most UK charities. Two England programmes are both open with no deadline, verified 21 June 2026:

Awards for All England: £300-£20,000, projects up to two years, decision in about 16 weeks.
Reaching Communities England: £20,001 upwards, projects up to five years, decision in about 40 weeks. One change worth knowing: since 1 June 2026 Reaching Communities funds single-region projects only: it no longer takes national or multi-region applications.

Fits: community and health/social-care charities of almost any size that want flexible project funding and can wait for the decision window.
Doesn't fit: organisations needing money in a hurry: even the smaller award takes around four months.

2. Garfield Weston Foundation: UK-wide

Open on a rolling basis with no deadlines, verified 21 June 2026, at two levels:

Regular Grants: up to £100,000 for core, project or capital costs; you complete an eligibility quiz, then apply online, with a decision in roughly four months.
Major Grants: £100,000+, but only where the total project cost is £1m or more (and core-cost applicants need income of £1m+). It runs as an Expression of Interest with bespoke guidance within 10 working days.

Fits: UK registered charities and CIOs working across welfare, youth, community, arts, faith, environment, education, health, museums and heritage.
Doesn't fit: very early-stage or unregistered groups, and Major Grants are genuinely for large capital and project budgets.

3. Esmée Fairbairn Foundation: UK-wide

A rolling Expression of Interest with no deadline, verified 16 June 2026. The main grants programme starts at £30,000 with no upper limit, over three to five years, for core, project or unrestricted costs. Read the exclusions before you start: it does not fund organisations with turnover under £100k, capital costs, healthcare, religious activity, independent education, or grants under £30,000.

Fits: established charities (turnover £100k+) working in environment, culture, or social-change priorities and wanting substantial, longer-term funding.
Doesn't fit: smaller organisations under the £100k turnover floor, or anyone seeking capital or healthcare funding.

4. Paul Hamlyn Foundation: UK-wide

Three funds open on a rolling basis, verified 16 June 2026, with decisions in around four months, and PHF explicitly prioritises work outside London:

Youth Fund: up to £150,000 over three years for charitable work with young people aged 14-25.
Migration Fund: multi-year funding for work with and for migrants.
Arts-based Learning Fund: £30,000-£300,000 over one to four years for arts organisations and schools.

5. BBC Children in Need: UK-wide, under-18s

Both streams state "no application deadline, apply at any time," verified 16 June 2026, for work with children and young people aged 18 and under. Core (organisational) costs run to £40,000 a year (up to £120,000 over three years) but only for organisations with turnover under £1m; Project costs are £1,000-£40,000 a year for up to three years. Both start with an Expression of Interest.

6. National Lottery Heritage Fund: UK-wide

Update, 6 August 2026. This post is a dated snapshot and is left as it was written. The National Lottery Heritage Fund round referred to below closes at 12 noon on 6 August 2026 — if you are reading this after that time, it has closed. The fund’s next fixed deadline for the £250,000–£10m tier is 12 noon on 12 November 2026, for a decision by the end of March 2027, read on the fund’s own deadlines page on 6 August 2026. Further 2027 rounds are expected, but the fund has not yet published them.

For heritage projects, Heritage Grants of £10,000-£250,000 are rolling with no deadline and an eight-week decision, verified 14 June 2026. Note the contrast that proves the point of this article: the fund's larger tier (£250,000-£10m) is not rolling: it runs to fixed deadlines, with the next at noon on 6 August 2026.

"Rolling" in a directory, but closed today

These are the entries that catch charities out. Each one is commonly listed as open or rolling somewhere, and each was verified shut to new applications when we last checked it:

Greggs Foundation, Community Action Fund. Often listed as rolling; the funder's own page says it "opens for funding four times a year" and was closed to new applications on 16 June 2026. It is round-based and location-restricted per round, not open all year.
Henry Smith Charity, Holiday Grants. The funder's page states it is closed for this period "as the funds have been allocated." It reopens on 20 August 2026 (for trips between 1 October and 31 December). Checked 18 June 2026.
Volant Charitable Trust. Both programmes are closed right now: Large Grants re-opens in July 2026, and Small Grants closed on 29 May 2026 and re-opens in early September. Re-checked 28 June 2026.
The Fore. Not rolling at all: it runs registration windows. The next one opens at noon on 8 July and closes at noon on 15 July 2026. Checked 8 June 2026.

And two big names that take no open applications regardless of what aggregators say: the Pears Foundation ("we are an invitation-only foundation") and the Tudor Trust, which now researches and invites partners rather than accepting requests.

The point: a "rolling" tag is a starting guess, not a status

Genuinely rolling funders (the National Lottery Community Fund, Garfield Weston, Esmée Fairbairn, Paul Hamlyn, BBC Children in Need) are a gift, because you apply when you're ready. But "rolling" copied from last year's listing is exactly how charities waste an afternoon on a fund that closed in spring. The only reliable test is the funder's own page, on the day you apply.

That's what every programme on our open-grants list carries: a plain-English status and a last-checked date, read off the funder's own site rather than a directory. If you'd like the new open calls that fit your charity, and a heads-up when a round like The Fore's actually opens, the free Friday email below is the simplest way to stay current.

To be clear about what GrantNest does and does not do: grants are checked open on the funder’s own page; profile matching is still in beta — a first filter to cut the noise, not the last word on whether you should apply.