By Vedat Mizrahi, Co-founder · 28 July 2026

UK charity grants genuinely open, checked 28 July 2026

On 28 July 2026 we re-read the funder page behind every grant programme in our served set and confirmed each one is open to applications today. Not open last month, not open when a database last refreshed: open on the funder's own page, this morning. Thirty programmes across thirteen funders were checked; thirty came back open. Below is what each page actually says, the one deadline that falls inside the next ten days, and three places where the wording is doing more work than a list can show.

Why re-read all of them rather than trust our own record? Because "verified" means sourced, not correct. A page that was right on 19 July can be wrong on 28 July, and presenting a closed programme as open is the worst error a funding list can make. Our verification method is written up here.

The National Lottery Community Fund: ten programmes, all open

Every National Lottery Community Fund programme we serve carries the line "Programme status: Open to applications" today. In England: National Lottery Awards for All England (£300 to £20,000, decision in 16 weeks), Awards for All England – Environment (same range, and you cannot apply if you already hold an Awards for All grant), and Reaching Communities England (£20,001 upwards, decision in 40 weeks; in 2025 the average award was £319,000 over three years).

In Scotland: Awards for All Scotland (£300 to £20,000, 12 weeks), Community Action (£20,001 to £250,000) and Fairer Life Chances (£20,001 to £500,000). Both larger Scottish programmes say the same thing about first-time applicants — if your organisation has not had long-term funding before, they are unlikely to offer more than £100,000.

In Wales: Awards for All Wales and People and Places (medium grants £20,001 to £100,000, large grants £100,001 to £500,000; large grants run a two-stage process and take at least 40 weeks). In Northern Ireland: Awards for All Northern Ireland, and Dormant Assets for All, which is worth reading twice — it funds work that strengthens your organisation and explicitly does not fund delivery of activities in your community.

Rolling funders with no deadline at all

Several major funders confirmed today that they accept applications continuously. BBC Children in Need states on both streams that "the Project Costs stream has no application deadline – you can apply at any time" and the same for Core Costs; both currently fund roughly one application in six. Esmée Fairbairn's page says "unless specified otherwise, we accept applications on a rolling basis with no deadlines", with a minimum grant of £30,000, no maximum, and an exclusion for organisations with turnover under £100,000.

The Paul Hamlyn Foundation shows "Rolling application cycle" against all three funds we serve: the Youth Fund (up to £150,000 over three years), the Migration Fund (up to £60,000 a year, and you must have an enquiry call with their team first) and the Arts-based Learning Fund (£30,000 to £300,000). The Robertson Trust's four Scottish funds are all live: Community Spaces says "apply at any time, there is no set closing date", Big Change That Lasts says "we accept applications on a rolling basis, with no closing dates", Small Grants is rolling, and Wee Grants carries a working online application form. Their decision timescale across all funds remains extended at 10–12 weeks.

Garfield Weston's Regular Grants portal is open, and the Major Grants route is open by expression of interest — but only where the total cost of what you are raising for is at least £1 million. National Lottery Heritage Grants of £10,000 to £250,000 states plainly: "there is no deadline so you can apply whenever you are ready", with a decision in eight weeks.

The deadline that matters this week

National Lottery Heritage Grants of £250,000 to £10 million are open, but on quarterly deadlines. The Heritage Fund's deadline page, read today, lists "12noon, 6 August 2026, to receive a decision by end of December 2026", followed by 12 November 2026. That is nine days away. Note the sequence: you must submit an expression of interest first and be invited to apply, so 6 August is realistically a date for projects already in the pipeline rather than one to start from cold. It is a deadline, not a closure — the programme rolls on to November.

The other dated programme is Community Foundation Wales's Fund for Wales, whose page says "applications for this grant are open" and "this fund will be closing Monday 9th November 12pm". Grants are £500 to £2,500 a year for up to three years, for organisations with income under £100,000. One trap on that page: a Community Interest Company registered in the last 18 months is not eligible, and applying anyway means rejection.

Three places where the wording matters more than the status

Trust for London says "most", not "all". Their page reads: "we accept applications on a rolling basis for most of our priority areas, so you can apply at any time. Our disability and racial justice funds operate a little differently." The programme is open. Whether your specific priority area is open on a rolling basis is a second question, and the honest answer is to check the priority page before you invest time.

The Randal Foundation says "should", not "must". Its small grant, run with Community Foundation Northern Ireland, is marked "Ongoing – No Deadline" with grants up to £3,000. The income line reads "organisations should have a turnover of less than £100,000 p/a". That is guidance, not a hard bar, and treating it as a bar would filter out organisations the funder might well support. The page also warns it may close at short notice if demand outstrips funds.

Community foundation hubs are not single programmes. Three of our records — Foundation Scotland, Quartet Community Foundation and Community Foundation North East — point at a hub rather than one fund. All three hubs are live today. But Foundation Scotland's "available now" filter returns dozens of separately-named local funds; Quartet is currently listing the Express Grant Programme, the Bristol City Council Culture Fund and a North Somerset community transport grant; Community Foundation North East is running named rolling funds such as the 1989 Willan Charitable Trust. The hub being open is true. It is not the same claim as a named fund being open, and we would rather say so than let a tidy row imply otherwise.

What is not on this list

Four programmes in the same set are currently suppressed as closed and were not re-checked today, because nothing here claims they are open. What closed during July gets its own post next week — publishing the negative is the point of the exercise, not an omission from it. Meanwhile the current verified-open set lives at our open grants page.

GrantNest is built around this principle: using an organisational profile to surface more relevant grants and tenders, then supporting the next step with practical application tools. To be clear about what that means in practice: grants are checked open on the funder's own page; tender coverage runs off the government's Find a Tender service rather than every local portal; profile matching is still in beta — a first filter to cut the noise, not the last word on whether you should apply; and application help is a checklist plus an editable opening draft, not a finished bid.

A list like this has a short shelf life, which is the whole argument for dating it. Everything above was read on 28 July 2026. If you are reading this a month from now, treat it as a starting point and check the funder's page yourself — or let us do the re-reading.