Scholarships for Ghanaian Students in Europe (2027)

Best scholarships for Ghanaian students

Chevening Scholarships funds one thing only: master. Tuition is covered in full, with return economy travel and a monthly living allowance. The 2027/28 round opened 4 August 2026 and closes 6 October 2026; results follow Mid-June 2027 onwards. Interviews are held at the British High Commission in Accra between March and April 2027, in person. Our Chevening scholarship guide sets out the four written answers.

Commonwealth Scholarships (UK) is open to you because Ghana is a Commonwealth member, and it is the only UK route that funds a doctorate: master, phd. Tuition is full, the stipend £1,712–2,000 per month, and it closes 20 October 2026. You must also apply through a national nominating agency, which sets its own earlier deadline — see our Commonwealth scholarship guide.

DAAD Scholarships covers bachelor, master, phd, postdoc, research-stay, language-course in Germany, with tuition waived by university, a stipend of €992–1,400 per month and insurance included. The Helmut-Schmidt-Programme intake opened 1 June 2026 and closed 31 July 2026; EPOS courses each set their own date. Details are on our DAAD scholarships guide.

Stipendium Hungaricum is the broadest by level — bachelor, master, phd, short-course, language-course — with tuition full, a stipend of HUF 43,700–180,000 per month and insurance. Ghana is a sending partner, so every application must be nominated at home. See our Stipendium Hungaricum guide.

Erasmus Mundus Joint Masters pays tuition in full plus €1,400 per month for a master’s split across at least two countries. Türkiye Bursları (Türkiye Scholarships) makes about 5,000 awards a year and opens 10 January 2026. Eiffel Excellence Scholarship Programme pays €1,200–2,100 per month but not tuition, and only a French institution can file it. Italian Government Scholarships for Foreign Students (MAECI) pays €1,200 per month for nine months.

What is NOT open to Ghanaian students (or only partly)

Poland’s Banach programme is closed: eligibility for Ghanaian nationals is no, and the country list is the whole test. Do not spend time on it.

Two more are marked restricted and restricted. Austria’s OeAD / Ernst Mach Grants funds research stays and doctoral work of one to nine months rather than a full degree, with 1024 incoming holders in 2025 and an age limit of 35; the university-of-applied-sciences variant runs on a closed country list. Spain’s MAEC-AECID Scholarships makes only 41 awards and is not for ordinary students: Permanent, non-temporary employment in or dependence on a public body in the applicant's own country, evidenced by the contract or appointment, plus written authorisation from the competent hierarchical superior. It also pays tuition of none.

Ireland’s Government of Ireland scholarship and Italy’s regional DSU grants carry no verified eligibility ruling for Ghana in our dataset, so treat them as unconfirmed rather than open.

Fully funded vs partial — know the difference

Fully funded means tuition plus a living allowance you can actually live on. Chevening, Commonwealth, Stipendium Hungaricum, Erasmus Mundus and Türkiye Bursları all pay tuition in full and add a monthly stipend — €1,400 per month on Erasmus Mundus, TRY 4,500–9,000 per month on Türkiye Bursları. None of them provides housing: Not applicable: no accommodation is provided; rent is paid from the monthly living allowance.

Partial means the gap is yours to fund, and the gap is usually tuition. Eiffel pays €1,200–2,100 per month but its tuition line reads None — tuition fees are not covered by the programme. MAECI’s tuition is Partial — the call states that some universities exempt grant holders from enrolment and tuition fees. The exemption depends on the institution, does not cover regional taxes and does not apply to Italian language courses. DAAD’s tuition line is waived by university, which works because German public tuition is free to begin with. Read the coverage line before the deadline, not after.

Scholarships by destination

Germany. Public tuition is free at bachelor’s and free at master’s, so a DAAD stipend of €992–1,400 per month against living costs of €850–1,200 per month turns a cheap degree into a funded one. Our Germany scholarships page lists the programme routes.

Hungary. Stipendium Hungaricum is the only scheme here that funds a first degree at scale, and Hungary is also the cheapest self-funded option, with tuition at €3,000–8,000 per year and living costs of €500–600 per month — see Hungary scholarships.

United Kingdom. Chevening and Commonwealth only. Without one, a taught master’s costs £9,000–30,000 per year before the £558 visa fee.

Türkiye. Türkiye Bursları places you at a university itself; you rank programmes inside the portal rather than applying first, and every holder takes a year of Turkish before the degree starts. See Türkiye scholarships.

France. Eiffel is filed by the French institution, never by you, so secure the master’s place through Études en France first and then ask its international office to present you. Public tuition is €255–3,950 per year in any case, and 547 Ghanaians were already studying there.

Italy. The MAECI grant runs nine months at €1,200 per month, with public tuition already at €200–4,200 per year on the country-income tiers.

Ireland, Malta, Cyprus and Poland have no scheme with a verified Ghanaian eligibility ruling, so plan those as self-funded or university-funded. Austria and Spain are the two to skip unless you are a doctoral researcher or a serving civil servant.

Eligibility & how to win

Level decides most of it. Chevening funds master; Commonwealth funds master, phd. Stipendium Hungaricum and Türkiye Bursları are the two that take school leavers, and for those your WASSCE (+ BECE) result is the entry document, graded A1–F9 (WAEC's 2006 circular): A1 75–100% Excellent; B2 70–74% Very Good; B3 65–69% Good; C4–C6 50–64% Credit; D7–E8 40–49% Pass; F9 0–39% Fail.

Grades matter differently by scheme. Commonwealth sets a floor of Upper second-class (2:1) honours, or lower second-class with a relevant postgraduate qualification; a contextualised route exists for disabled applicants nominated through the Commonwealth Disabled People's Forum, which on the Ghanaian 4.0 scale (UCC): First 3.6–4.0, 2nd Upper 3.0–3.5, 2nd Lower 2.5–2.9, 3rd 2.0–2.4, Pass 1.0–1.9 means a Second Class Upper. Türkiye Bursları sets 70%. Chevening publishes no minimum grade at all.

Age and work experience are the quiet filters. Türkiye Bursları, Eiffel and OeAD cap entry at 35; MAECI at 40. Chevening asks for At least 2,800 hours acquired after the undergraduate degree and over a minimum of two years — roughly two years of full-time work at 35 hours a week; full-time, part-time and voluntary work and paid or unpaid internships count, entered as up to 15 employment periods. Commonwealth asks for none.

One properly built application beats four rushed ones, because every scheme rejects on the same three things: a missing nomination, an unverifiable transcript and an essay that answers a different question.

Ghana’s own funding

Two bodies fund study abroad from home. The Ghana Scholarships Authority, created by Act 1149 in 2025 to replace the Ghana Scholarship Secretariat, covers tertiary, professional, local and foreign study, and its abroad eligibility is yes. It is also the body that nominates Ghanaians for Stipendium Hungaricum and forwards Commonwealth nominations, so you will deal with it even on a foreign award.

GETFund’s abroad eligibility is yes in practice, but the legal position is disputed: GETFund Act 581 restricts the fund to domestic scholarships, and the Auditor-General’s 2020 audit called most of its foreign awards between 2012 and 2018 unlawful. Confirm the current call on scholarships.gov.gh before you build a plan around either.

Deadlines to watch

The 2027/28 cycle is already open. Chevening runs 4 August 2026 to 6 October 2026, both at 11:00 UTC. Commonwealth closes 20 October 2026, with nominating agencies setting earlier dates of their own. OeAD closes 1 December 2026. Türkiye Bursları opens 10 January 2026 and closes 20 February 2026. Stipendium Hungaricum’s last published window ran 17 November 2025 to 15 January 2026; the 2027/28 dates were not published as of September 2026. Eiffel’s last session closed 8 January 2026 and MAECI’s 26 March 2026. MAECI’s 2027/28 call had not appeared by September 2026 either, and DAAD’s EPOS courses each publish their own date rather than a common one. Work backwards from the earliest date that applies to you: references, transcripts and certified translations take longer to collect than the form takes to fill. Miss one and the next chance is a full year later.