How do Polish and German researchers apply for a joint project? NCN, DFG and Weave

The problem a lead agency solves

Research funding is organised nationally. A Polish researcher applies to the NCN, a German researcher to the DFG, and each agency reviews proposals by its own rules and on its own timetable. For a joint project this used to mean two proposals, two reviews and the real risk that one side is funded and the other is not, which makes the whole project impossible.

The lead agency procedure solves this by trust between agencies. Only one of them, the lead agency, carries out the assessment of merit; the other partners accept its result and fund the projects it recommends. The NCN describes it in exactly those terms, and the DFG adds that each funder pays for its own team’s share of an approved project.

From Beethoven to Weave

Polish–German cooperation of this kind is older than Weave. The NCN, founded in 2011 and based in Kraków, began working with the DFG in 2014, when the two agreed on joint project funding in the social sciences and humanities. The joint call was named Beethoven, according to the DFG in homage to Beethoven’s birthplace, Bonn, where the DFG has its head office. It was later extended to other subjects and then to all of them. By September 2021 the DFG and NCN had jointly funded more than 120 bilateral research projects.

Weave was launched in December 2020 by European funding organisations that work together in Science Europe, to simplify joint proposals from researchers in up to three European countries or regions. The DFG and NCN began using it on 15 September 2021. It is not a separate funding programme with its own money: proposals compete with all others in the national schemes, and the agencies aim to fund the top 20 percent in each evaluation.

Route one: the DFG as lead agency (Weave-UNISONO)

If the coordinating applicant works in Germany, the DFG can be the lead agency. The German coordinator submits the complete joint proposal to the DFG; on the German side the only scheme open to Weave is the DFG’s Individual Research Grants Programme, so the German share follows its rules, described on From proposal to decision. The DFG accepts such proposals at any time. German applicants must have completed their research training, usually a doctorate.

The Polish team files its own proposal with the NCN in the OSF system, attaching the same joint proposal, within seven calendar days of the submission to the DFG; the two versions must be consistent. The NCN first checks formal eligibility, and only proposals found eligible by all partners go on to the DFG’s review, where they are ranked against German proposals in the same scheme. The NCN decides within up to twelve months of the Polish submission and funds the Polish team only if the partner agency funds its side.

For proposals submitted to the NCN in 2026, the NCN set aside 50 million złoty for Weave-UNISONO. The Polish part may last 24, 36 or 48 months, but when the partner team applies to the DFG the maximum is 36 months, which matches the DFG’s own limit for Weave projects. A project can be bilateral, with one foreign team, or trilateral, with two (status as of 3 November 2026).

Route two: the NCN as lead agency (OPUS LAP/Weave)

If the coordinator is in Poland, the proposal can go through the NCN as lead agency, as part of its autumn OPUS call. The NCN assesses the proposal; if it is recommended, the NCN funds the Polish teams and the DFG funds the German team, which must submit its own proposal to the DFG under the DFG’s terms. The DFG notes one restriction: with the NCN as lead agency, only one German applicant is allowed, and a project with several German applicants needs the DFG as lead.

The current call, OPUS 32 with LAP/Weave, opened on 15 September 2026, and Polish teams must submit through OSF by 2 pm on 15 December 2026. Besides the DFG, the NCN’s partners in it are the research funders of Austria, the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Switzerland, Luxembourg and Flanders, and for the first time Spain (status as of 3 November 2026). All teams in a project must contribute in a balanced and complementary way; the NCN states that proposals in which one side’s role is not significant must not be recommended.

What the two routes have in common

The choice of route follows from where the coordinating applicant works, not from a preference for one agency’s reviewers. In both, the research is basic research in any discipline, one agency reviews and both pay, and in both the joint proposal must be equally strong as a national one. The NCN also allows trilateral projects, for instance with a third team from Austria or the Czech Republic.

The deadlines, exchange rates and cost rules change from call to call, so we do not repeat them here; the NCN’s call documents and the DFG’s Weave page set them out. For researchers who would rather spend time in Germany than run a joint project from home, the Humboldt Foundation and the DAAD fund individual stays. Why so many of these organisations sit in one city is explained in Why are Germany’s big research funders based in Bonn?