The UNHCR Innovation Accelerator helps tested humanitarian innovations move from successful pilots toward sustainable scale. UNHCR Innovation leads the initiative with internal and external partners, with support from the Government of Luxembourg.
Selected organizations develop scaling strategies, partnerships, evidence, and operational readiness for solutions serving forcibly displaced or stateless people and host communities. The 2026 Expression of Interest is closed, and UNHCR has not announced the next opening date.
Benefits & funding
- Selected initiatives may receive catalytic seed funding; up to USD 250,000 is available only in exceptional cases, and most awards are expected to be lower.
- Support may cover operational preparation, partnership development, community and refugee-led participation, testing in new contexts, technical adaptation, and evidence generation.
- Teams may also receive strategy and governance advice, technical and operational guidance, mentoring, partnership brokering, learning support, and help with resource mobilization.
Eligibility
- The Expression of Interest stage accepts organizations with a proven concept that supports forcibly displaced or stateless people and/or host communities and is ready to scale.
- Eligible organization types include UN agencies, NGOs, civil-society organizations, private companies, academic or research institutions, social enterprises, and other partners; no country-specific restriction is stated.
- A concept must have real-world implementation evidence, such as operational testing, preliminary results, and user validation; concept-only proposals are not eligible.
- A full proposal must be led or co-led by a UNHCR team or a refugee-led nonprofit organization whose leadership has direct lived experience of forced displacement.
- A consortium is not required at the first stage, but each Expression of Interest must cover only one initiative.
Can you apply?
Open to all applicants
No nationality, residency, education, or experience limits are listed.
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Application process
- 1Submit one Expression of Interest with evidence of the proof of concept, operational relevance, scaling ambition, partnership ecosystem, and expected impact.
- 2If selected, join the collaboration and proposal-development phase, then submit a full scaling proposal led or co-led by a UNHCR team or refugee-led nonprofit organization.
- 3If shortlisted after technical review, pitch the initiative to the Innovation Accelerator Steering Committee for final selection.
Program timeline
Extended Expression of Interest deadline.
Jul 31, 2026
Date not announced
Next application cycle.