EFCSN Expansion Grants

• Eligibility Criteria: Organisations must be based in the European Union or DEP-associated countries (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Iceland, Kosovo, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Norway, Serbia, Turkey, Ukraine).
• Type of Funding: Grant
• Target Region: Europe
• Application Language: English

The European Fact-Checking Standards Network (EFCSN) has announced a call for Expansion Grants to grow and support fact-checking and information integrity work in Europe with a particular focus on underserved regions.

Thematics

These grants are designed to support:

• Reinforcement of fact-checking capacity in underrepresented regions or regions in danger of losing fact-checking coverage.
• Development of operational and organisational resilience in young or emerging fact-checking teams or organisations, understood as organisations that have been operational for less than three years, are volunteer-based and are looking to professionalise, or small organisations at a strategic inflection point at which they need to professionalise in order to survive.
• Expansion of fact-checking coverage in countries and languages that are currently not at all or only to a limited extent covered by the work of EFCSN-certified fact-checkers such as Central and Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, Ukraine, Moldova, Finland, the Netherlands, Ireland or Malta.
• Support for organisations seeking EFCSN certification and long-term sustainability.
• Knowledge exchange with and mentoring by mature fact-checking organisations that have been operational for more than 5 years.

Eligibility 

To be eligible for funding, applicants must meet the following requirements:

• Legal entity: Applicants must be a legal entity, whether for-profit or non-profit.
• Certification: Applicants must be EFCSN certified fact-checking organisations or fact-checking organisations that can demonstrate sincere intent to comply with the European Code of Standards for Independent Fact-Checking Organisations.
• Location: Organisations must be based in the European Union or DEP-associated countries (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Iceland, Kosovo, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Norway, Serbia, Turkey, Ukraine).
• Single applicants or consortia: The call is open for single applicants or consortia of organisations.

Additional details 

• Maximum Grant Amount: €67,000 per project.
• Funding rate: 50%
• Form of grant: lump sums
• Number of Grants: max. 2 grants will be awarded.
• Payment Structure: 50% upon grant agreement signature, 50% following the approval of the final project report.Costs must be reasonable, not excessive, and needed.
• Max. Grant Duration: 12 months.
• Exact amount must be calculated using this template table.

How to apply 

To apply, please fill out this application form. The call closes on May 8 at 23:59. Evaluations will take place in May 2026, results will be communicated in July 2026.

For more information, please visit this page.