NIH Funding Curves (FY 2021 - 2026)
The following funding curves were originally created by Jeremy Berg using publicly available data from NIH RePORTER. These visualizations demonstrate differences in the cumulative number of awards and cumulative amount obligated across NIH awards from fiscal year (FY) 2021 to 2026. The NIH FY runs from October 1st through September 30th. For more discussions about the delays in NIH funding, read the related articles published by Nature and Science.
In the following visualizations, the bolded red line demonstrates the trends for FY 2025 and the bolded orange line demonstrates the current trend for FY 2026 (as of 2026-03-06), with the remaining lines demonstrating trends from FY 2021-2024.
Overview
From these visualizations, we can see that the total number of awards made in FY 2025 (which was 68,791) is less than the average number of awards across FY 2021 - 2024 (which was 74,804), with a significant lag occurring during the spring and into the summer (March through August), consistent with reported disruptions to grant review and funding processes.
Similarly, the total funding obligated across these awards was less in FY 2025 (which was $39.80B) compared to the average across FY 2021 through 2024 (which was $40.53B).
Additionally, we are seeing a lag in awards made in FY 2026, with only 8,001 awards as of 2026-03-06, totaling $4.01B. On the same date in FY 2025, the counts were 12,589. Still, these awards are less than the average cumulative number made on the same date from FY 2021-2024, which was 15,614 awards.
By Award Type
The following graphs are further broken down by the type of grant awarded during that fiscal year, including new and competitive renewal awards (Type 1, 2, 4, 9) versus non-competitive renewal awards (Type 5, 6, 7, 8).
New applications are the first request for funding for a project that has not previously received that specific grant. Competitive Renewals are requests for continued funding after the original project period ends; these applications go through full peer review and must compete again for funding.
In contrast, Non-Competitive Renewals provide continued funding for the next budget period within an already approved multi-year project and generally do not undergo full peer review, assuming satisfactory progress and compliance with administrative requirements. More information about the different types of NIH grants can be found here.
In FY 2025, the total number of New and Competitively Renewed awards (n = 16,938) was lower than the average annual total in the previous four FYs (n = 19,769).
As of 2026-03-06 in FY 2026, 767 New and Competitive Renewal awards have been made. On the same date in FY 2025, the counts were 2,630. Comparatively, the New and Competitive Renewal awards made on the same date for FY 2021-2024 averaged to 3,504 awards.
Similar trends are observed for Non-Competitive Renewals. By the end of FY 2025, 48,165 awards had been made, compared with an average year-end total of 49,204 awards across FY 2021–2024.
As of 2026-03-06 for this FY 2026, only 6991 Non-Competitive Renewal Awards have been made. On the same date in FY 2025, the counts were 9,464. Comparatively, the Non-Competitive Renewal awards made on the same date for FY 2021-2024 averaged to 11,371 awards.