Australian Government RTP Scholarships: Fully Funded PhD and Research Master’s

The Australian Government Research Training Program (RTP) funds international and domestic students to complete a PhD or a master’s by research at an Australian university. It covers tuition in full and pays a tax-free annual living stipend. The detail that almost every guide misses: the stipend is not one national figure. Universities set their own rate above a government base, and the gap between the lowest and highest is close to AUD 10,000 a year.

Last verified: 20 September 2026 against the Australian Department of Education RTP page and individual university scholarship pages.

RTP Scholarships: The Short Answer

RTP support comes in three parts: a Fees Offset covering your tuition, a Stipend for living costs paid fortnightly and indexed each year, and Allowances for things like relocation, thesis costs and Overseas Student Health Cover. You do not apply to the Australian Government. Funding is distributed to universities as block grants, and each university runs its own application, selection and offer process.

The Stipend Gap Nobody Tells You About

The government publishes a base rate and a maximum rate, indexed annually from 1 January, with the following year’s rates announced by 1 October. Within that band, each university decides what it pays. Recent published rates show how wide the spread is:

Provider	Published annual stipend (full-time, tax-free)
Government base rate (2026)	AUD 34,315
Flinders University (2026)	AUD 36,061
QUT (2026 → 2027)	AUD 37,010 → 38,310
Australian National University (2026)	AUD 39,069
University of Sydney (2026 → 2027)	AUD 42,754 → 44,293

Over a three-and-a-half year PhD, choosing a university paying AUD 44,000 instead of one paying AUD 35,000 is worth more than AUD 30,000 in total. That is a larger difference than most applicants will ever negotiate in a first job. Yet applicants routinely pick a university on reputation alone and never compare the published stipend.

Rates change every year, so treat the table above as an illustration of the spread rather than current figures. Before you shortlist, open the RTP scholarship page of each university you are considering and write down its stipend for your commencing year.

What RTP Covers

• Fees Offset: full tuition for your research degree, typically for up to four years for a doctorate
• Stipend: tax-free fortnightly living allowance at your university’s published rate
• Overseas Student Health Cover for international students, and at some universities for dependants, where the university funds it as an allowance
• Relocation and establishment allowance — for example, Flinders publishes up to AUD 1,485 against receipts
• Thesis printing and publication allowances
• Paid medical, maternity and parental leave at many universities, and a dependant child allowance at some

Allowances are the part that varies most. Two students on identical stipends can have very different real incomes depending on whether their university funds health cover and relocation. Check the allowance list, not just the headline number.

What RTP Will NOT Fund

Coursework degrees. This is the single biggest misconception. RTP funds Higher Degrees by Research only — a PhD or a master’s by research with a substantial research component. A taught master’s in business, public health or engineering does not qualify, no matter how good your grades are. If you want a coursework master’s in Australia, RTP is not your route and you should look at university-specific international scholarships instead.

A second scholarship at the same level. Most universities exclude applicants who have already held an Australian Government or university HDR scholarship at the same level, or who have already completed an HDR at that level.

Double-dipping on living allowances. You generally cannot hold another living-allowance scholarship alongside an RTP stipend.

One more practical limit: the stipend is designed for a single student’s living costs. In Sydney or Melbourne, AUD 40,000 a year is workable but not comfortable if you are supporting a family, and rental markets in both cities are tight. Research your specific city’s rents before assuming the number is generous.

Who Can Apply

• International or domestic applicants commencing, or already enrolled in, an eligible Higher Degree by Research
• An outstanding academic record — competitive applicants typically have first-class honours or equivalent, and often prior research output
• Meeting the university’s English language requirement at the time of application, not later
• Admission to the research degree itself — scholarship selection sits on top of admission, not instead of it
• Not currently holding another living-allowance scholarship

Prior research experience matters more here than in most scholarships. A published paper, a strong honours thesis or a research assistant role will do more for your application than general leadership activities.

How to Apply: Step by Step

1. Find a supervisor first. This is the step that decides most outcomes. Australian HDR admission depends on a supervisor with capacity agreeing to take your project. Email academics whose published work genuinely overlaps with your proposal.
2. Compare stipend rates and allowances across the universities where a suitable supervisor exists. Use the published figures for your commencing year.
3. Check the application rounds. Deadlines vary by university and by research period — for example, one major university set 11 September 2026 for its early 2027 rounds and 18 December 2026 for later ones.
4. Sit your English test early so the result is in hand at application time.
5. Prepare your research proposal, transcripts, CV, publications list and referees.
6. Apply for admission to the HDR programme, and complete the scholarship section. At some universities, including ANU, commencing students are automatically considered with no separate scholarship application.
7. Wait on the university’s selection round. Ranking is competitive and internal to each institution.

Worked Example: The Supervisor Email That Gets a Reply

Australian academics receive dozens of speculative emails a week and ignore nearly all of them. The difference is visible in the first two lines.

Ignored: “Dear Professor, I am a highly motivated graduate with first-class honours and I am very interested in pursuing a PhD under your supervision in your esteemed department. Please find my CV attached. I would be grateful for the opportunity.”

Answered: “Dear Dr Okafor, your 2025 paper on groundwater recharge in semi-arid catchments used a method I applied to a much smaller dataset in my honours thesis, and I ran into the calibration problem you describe in section four. I would like to extend that work to the Sokoto basin, where fifteen years of borehole data exist but have never been modelled. I am applying for RTP funding for the March 2027 intake and wanted to ask whether you have supervision capacity and whether this direction fits your group’s current work.”

The second email proves the applicant read the work, identifies a specific gap they could fill, names a dataset that makes the project feasible, and asks a clear question about capacity. It takes an hour to write properly. Send five of those rather than fifty of the first kind.

Common Mistakes

• Applying for a coursework master’s and expecting RTP to fund it
• Choosing a university without comparing published stipend rates and allowances
• Leaving the supervisor search until after submitting an application
• Missing the English test requirement at application time
• Sending generic supervisor emails in bulk
• Assuming one national deadline exists — rounds differ by university and research period
• Paying an agent for “guaranteed” RTP placement; universities select on merit and no intermediary can influence it

Australian RTP Scholarship FAQ

How much is the RTP stipend?

It depends on the university. The Australian Government sets a base and maximum rate indexed each January, and universities set their own rate within that band — recent published rates have ranged from roughly AUD 34,000 to over AUD 44,000 a year, tax-free.

Can I use RTP for a taught master’s degree?

No. RTP funds Higher Degrees by Research only — a PhD or a master’s by research with a substantial research component. Coursework-only degrees are not eligible.

Do I apply to the Australian Government?

No. The government provides block grants to universities, and each university runs its own application, selection and offer process. Apply to the university.

What is the RTP deadline?

There is no single deadline. Each university sets rounds tied to its research periods, and some run two or more international rounds a year. Check your chosen university’s HDR scholarship page.

Does RTP cover health insurance?

Often, but not universally. Many universities fund Overseas Student Health Cover for international RTP recipients as an allowance, and some extend it to dependants. Confirm on the specific university’s page.

Do I need a supervisor before applying?

In practice, yes. Australian HDR admission normally depends on a supervisor with capacity agreeing to your project, and without admission there is no scholarship.

Is part-time study funded?

Part-time RTP stipends are paid at 50 per cent of the university’s full-time rate. Note that international student visa conditions usually require full-time enrolment.

Your Next Step

Do two things this week. Identify five academics whose published work overlaps with what you want to research, and write down the RTP stipend and allowance package at each of their universities. Those two lists, cross-referenced, tell you exactly where to send your five supervisor emails — and that ordering, supervisor first and paperwork second, is what separates funded applicants from the rest.

Comparing destinations? See our guides to Gates Cambridge for UK doctoral study, DAAD EPOS for Germany, Erasmus Mundus across Europe and the Fulbright Foreign Student Program for the USA.

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