UK Farming Grants: What Is Open Right Now
Every farm funding scheme in England as it stands today — what is open, what it pays, when it shuts, and what has already gone. Sourced to gov.uk, with no deadline stated harder than its source states it. Last updated 22 September 2026.
The Whole Picture, One Table
| Scheme | Status | Money | Deadline | Who it is for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ADOPT Fund Round 9 | Open | £50k–£200k per project | 11am, 7 October 2026 | Farm businesses leading a trial |
| Farming Futures: Automation and Robotics R2 | Open | Share of £20m | 11:00am, 30 September 2026 | Agri-tech businesses with farm partners |
| SFI26 Window 2 | Closed | £233m, allocated in one day | Opened 22 September 2026, closed 15:48 the same day | All eligible farmers and land managers |
| Capital Grants 2026 | Closed | £225m, ~17,000 applications | Closed 1 September 2026 — budget allocated | Farmers, England |
| FETF 2026 | Closed | £50m, ~7,000 agreements | Closed midday, 12 May 2026 | Farmers, growers, foresters, contractors |
| SFI26 Window 1 | Closed | — | Closed 11:59pm, 28 August 2026 | — |
| Farmer Collaboration Fund | Open, but not to you | £30m | — | Organisations running farm groups, not individual farms |
The line that changed this week: SFI26 Window 2 opened and closed on the same day. It opened on the morning of 22 September with £233 million, passed a quarter allocated before midday, and DEFRA shut it at 15:48 once enough applications were in to use the lot. An application started but not submitted by then cannot be submitted. What that means if you applied, and if you did not.
What You Can Actually Apply For
ADOPT Fund, Round 9
£50,000–£200,000, closes 11am on 7 October 2026. A doubled ceiling this round. You run the idea on your own holding, in real field conditions, with the farm business leading the project rather than an institution. A separate £2,500 grant covers help with writing the application — and it closes first, at 11:00am on 30 September, a week before the bid it is meant to support. Ask for the help after that and there is nothing left to ask for. The rules.
Farming Futures: Automation and Robotics
A share of £20 million, closes 11:00am on 30 September 2026. Round 2 of the Farming Innovation Programme's robotics fund. Read who applies before anyone tells you otherwise: projects need total eligible costs of £500,000 to £2.5 million, so this is not a farm buying a robot. What it does do is make farms worth having in a consortium — where farmers, growers or foresters request grant funding, at least 50% of that amount must go to ones based in England. What Round 2 funds.
SFI26 Window 2 — closed 22 September
£233 million, allocated in under six hours. £180 million set aside for the window, the extra £50 million announced by the Prime Minister, and £3 million Window 1 left behind. Two small groups who contacted the RPA before the close can still finish: farmers the RPA is applying for, and farmers a technical fault stopped. Everyone else waits for the SFI offer in 2027, with details to come. The day, hour by hour, and all 71 actions and what each pays.
Capital Grants 2026 — closed 1 September
£225 million, allocated in five weeks. Opened 30 July, 75% gone by 1 August, shut on 1 September with about 17,000 applications in — 9,500 of them first-timers, a third from farms under 50 hectares. Applications started but not submitted before the close will not be processed. Submitted ones are being assessed in the order received, with offers expected to keep going out through the rest of the year, and DEFRA has no confirmed date yet for a 2027 round. If you applied, read this.
Which Of These Pays For Technology
Two different things get funded, and confusing them wastes an application.
The kit — FETF, closed
FETF paid a fixed share of a fixed expected cost for named equipment: GPS light bars at a £323 grant, retrofit variable-rate controllers at £1,945, camera-guided spot sprayers at £23,000, robotic drills at £25,000. Its 2026 round closed on 12 May, and DEFRA has said it was the last standalone one. The full item list, all 287 of them, is worth knowing anyway — it is the clearest published statement of what government considers fundable farm technology, and the 2027 offer is being built from these schemes.
The practice — SFI26, closed until 2027
SFI26 does not buy you equipment; it pays per hectare per year for doing the thing. It is closed to new applications until the 2027 offer. Its Precision farming, equipment and technology category holds three actions: PRF1 variable rate application of nutrients, £27/ha/year; PRF2 camera or remote sensor guided herbicide spraying, £43/ha/year; PRF4 mechanical robotic weeding, £150/ha/year. Neighbouring categories pay for the data underneath — soil health and nutrient management actions from £73 to £532 per hectare per year.
The honest reading: £27/ha/year for variable rate nutrients is worth having and is not a reason to buy a variable-rate controller. It pays for a practice a contractor's kit can already deliver. What the equipment costs is on our costs page, and the mapping and the recommendation cost nothing at all through our field NDVI viewer and RB209 nutrient calculator.
Two Pots That Are Not Farm Applications
Both get written about as farming money. Neither is something a farm business applies for, and knowing that now saves an afternoon.
Farmer Collaboration Fund — £30 million
Applied for by the organisations that run collaborative groups, not by individual farms. The way it reaches your holding is by being in a group that wins funding, which makes “who around here is putting a bid together” the useful question rather than “how do I apply”. What it does and does not do.
AgriScale — £13 million, closed
Innovate UK money for agri-tech companies scaling precision agriculture hardware from prototype to manufacturing — not for farms buying it. Applications closed 3 June 2026. It matters to a farmer only in that it shapes what reaches the market in a few years. What it funds.
Windows Close Faster Than Decisions Get Made
The pattern across every scheme on this page is the same. FETF drew roughly 7,000 successful applications from £50 million and had its window extended once. Capital Grants allocated 75% in days and closed in five weeks. SFI26 Window 2 went further: opened and closed on the same day.
None of that is a reason to rush an application. It is a reason to have the answer ready before the window opens: a costed wishlist tied to a specific problem on your holding, with quotes, specifications and the field data that justifies the purchase.
We publish a sourced summary whenever a scheme opens, moves or closes, and email it to anyone who has asked for grant alerts — with the gov.uk link, never a scrape, and nothing else in the message.
Get the grant alerts. Or read what we have written so far in news.
Every Figure on This Page
- DEFRA Farming Blog — SFI26 update: Window 1 now closed (29 August 2026) (Window 1 closing, “we expect Window 2 to open from 22 September”, the extra £50 million, the unspent budget rolling forward, the £290 million scheme total).
- DEFRA Farming Blog — SFI26: Window 2 now open (22 September 2026) (the £233 million and what it is made of) and SFI26: Window 2 now closed (15:48, the exception groups, the 2027 offer).
- GOV.UK — FETF 2026 and DEFRA — FETF agreements being issued (closing date, £50 million, ~7,000 agreements, item grant amounts).
- DEFRA Farming Blog — Capital Grants 2026 guidance (£225 million, the six groups, the £25,000 and £35,000 caps, one application per SBI, 75% allocated).
- DEFRA Farming Blog — Capital Grants 2026 now closed (1 September 2026) (closed with the budget allocated, ~17,000 applications, ~9,500 first-time, one-third under 50 hectares, offers through the rest of the year, no 2027 date).
- GOV.UK — SFI26 actions (every action and payment rate, including the PRF, soil health and nutrient management figures).
- Our sourced write-ups: Capital Grants, ADOPT Round 9, Farmer Collaboration Fund, AgriScale and FETF 2027.
Educational, not financial advice. Scheme terms, budgets and dates change — check gov.uk before acting on any figure here. Where a source says “expected”, so does this page.