Federal Grant Funding Right Now: The Mid-2026 Snapshot

Most writing about federal grants is either timeless or breathless. This page is neither: it is a dated snapshot of the actual funding board — every opportunity Grants Radar tracks on Grants.gov, joined to the public spending records behind the programs offering them. All figures are as of July 5, 2026; the methodology note at the bottom explains exactly where each number comes from and how to verify it.

The board at a glance

• 1,363 open opportunities accepting applications right now, plus 546 forecasted ones agencies have announced for later — across 24 top-level agencies.
• Behind those listings sit 465 distinct federal programs (Assistance Listings). The 414 of them with recent spending history obligated a combined $267.3 billion in awards across fiscal years 2024–2026.
• 424 open opportunities close within the next 30 days — roughly three in ten. Half the board closes within 90.

Where the money is

One agency dominates the open board: the Department of Health and Human Services holds 632 of the 1,363 open opportunities — just under half — and the programs behind its listings obligated more than the rest of the table combined. Open-opportunity counts and each agency's program history:

Two honest caveats. The obligation column measures each agency's programs behind currently-open listings, independently per row — a program spanning agencies can appear in more than one rollup, so the column is not meant to be summed. And Defense looks smaller here than it is: much of its research money moves through contracts and the SBIR portals rather than Grants.gov (our grants-versus-contracts guide explains that split). Browse any of these agencies’ live listings on the agency pages.

The biggest programs behind today’s openings

Joining each open opportunity to its program’s three-year award history surfaces a pattern worth internalizing: some of the largest programs in government are behind a single listing, while NIH’s research institutes run dozens of doors into the same funding stream.

Read the last two columns together and the shape of federal funding becomes visible. The block-grant giants (child care, transit, homelessness) move enormous money through one or two announcements aimed at states and large institutions. The research institutes move comparable money through hundreds of concurrent opportunities with thousands of individual awards — which is why a research team’s odds look nothing like a block grant’s. Every grant page on this site now shows this same history card for its own program.

Deadline pressure

Of the 1,363 open opportunities: 424 close within 30 days, 560 within 60, and 686 within 90. Another 125 post no close date at all — rolling programs that review applications as they arrive. If a deadline in the next month matters to you, the deadlines board sorts all of this by month, and our statuses guide covers the fine print that disqualifies late applicants.

What the money is for

By the categories agencies assign their own listings: Health leads with 590 open opportunities, followed by science, technology and R&D (403), education (178), income security and social services (93), and environment (68) — with 108 filed under “other.” The category pages hold the live lists.

The SBIR restart, visible in the data

Six open opportunities carry SBIR or STTR in their titles — a number worth watching rather than a number that impresses. The programs were reauthorized in April 2026 after a six-month lapse, agencies are still restarting their solicitation calendars, and much of the SBIR pipeline posts on agency portals outside Grants.gov. Expect this count to climb through the fall.

Methodology and sources

Opportunity counts, statuses, agencies, categories, and close dates come from the public Grants.gov API as of July 5, 2026, covering the opportunities Grants Radar tracks (posted and forecasted discretionary listings). Program obligation figures come from the public USAspending.gov API: grant and cooperative-agreement obligations for each Assistance Listing across fiscal years 2024 through 2026 to date. Numbers are point-in-time and will drift as agencies post, amend, and close listings; this page is regenerated periodically with its “updated” date bumped. Every figure can be verified at the sources named — and every opportunity behind these numbers is browsable from the live board.