Lloyds Bank Foundation Grants 2026: Full Guide

Grantsights only makes grant software for US funding, so this guide sends you to the Foundation itself and to other UK sources rather than to anything we sell. If UK coverage from us would help, let us know you're in the UK.

Lloyds Bank Foundation in 2026: Closed, Changing and Scaling Up

The Foundation is in the first year of a 9-year strategy, In a Good Place, which runs to 2035. Its funding page (opens in a new tab) says it's "scaling up" and taking a mixed approach to investment this year. Here's where each strand stood on October 29, 2026:

The Foundation's funding page also says further funding rounds focused on a community that's a good place to live will follow. It gives no dates.

Our honest read: there's nothing to apply for today, and two of the 2026 strands aren't open to applications at all. The useful move is to understand what the Foundation has funded, check whether you match its new priorities, and sign up for its funding announcements email (opens in a new tab) so the next round doesn't pass you by.

The New Beginnings Fund: What It Offered and What Happens Now

The New Beginnings Fund is the Foundation's largest ever single fund, according to its October 26, 2026 news post. The programme page (opens in a new tab) says the Foundation is investing £8 million in homelessness prevention and will make 40 to 50 grants of up to £200,000 over four years. The grants are unrestricted, so they can pay for any costs that further your organisation's purpose.

It targets four points in life when homelessness risk is highest:

• leaving prison
• leaving care as a young adult
• leaving the asylum system after getting leave to remain
• leaving an abusive relationship

The Foundation's July 13, 2026 post explains the choice. It picked turning points with strong evidence of homelessness risk, an existing network of specialist community organisations, a link to community or supported housing, and a sector small enough that demand would stay "proportionate to the number of grants available". It cites a homelessness rate around 40 times higher for people leaving prison (6.3% against 0.16%), and says one third of care leavers experience homelessness within two years.

Timeline, from the programme page:

That's roughly 1 grant for every 12 to 15 applications, or about 7% to 8%. If you applied, expect about 14 weeks from the deadline to a final answer.

What 502 Recent Grants Show

Grantsights analysis of 360Giving data published by the Foundation covers 502 grants dated March 6, 2023 to September 1, 2025, worth £38.67 million. The striking finding is how uniform they are: most were the same size, same length and same purpose.

Data: 360Giving data published by Lloyds Bank Foundation for England and Wales (CC BY 4.0), via the 360Giving Datastore API, downloaded October 29, 2026. Award dates March 6, 2023 to September 1, 2025, the latest in the data.

By programme, the money went like this:

The descriptions of the 2025 core grants read the same way: an "unrestricted grant over 3 years towards the core costs" of the charity. For example, Sleepsafe received £75,000 in May 2025 (Sleepsafe Selby, North Yorkshire), and Refugee Women Connect in Liverpool received £75,000 in January 2025. The newest record in the data is £75,000 to Northern Engagement into Recovery from Addiction Foundation in Sunderland, dated September 1, 2025.

The larger grants were national or strategic. Generation Rent received £250,000 in August 2024 to support the Renters Reform Coalition, and Trust for London received £1,000,000 in April 2025 as seven-year match funding for its Racial and Economic Justice Fund. Neither came from an open small-charity round.

Where the money went. Grantsights mapped each recipient's postcode to its region using the ONS postcode directory via postcodes.io:

London took 22% of grants. That fits the Foundation's own admission, on its decision-making page (opens in a new tab), that its investments were "concentrated unintentionally in cities, at the expense of the countryside and the coasts". It now says it'll expand into every parliamentary constituency in England and Wales by 2030. If you're a rural or coastal charity, that's a reason to keep watching.

Grants per year are falling. The data shows 198 grants in 2023, 198 in 2024 and 106 in 2025 up to September. Back in 2010, the Foundation made 867 grants with a median of £20,000. It now makes fewer, larger, longer grants.

What Size of Charity Gets Funded

Grantsights matched the recipients of the 427 core grants (Specialist, DDPO, Racial Equity and Propel) to the Charity Commission register. 402 matched with an income figure.

Income is each charity's latest figure on the Charity Commission register extract (opens in a new tab) dated October 29, 2026, not its income when it applied.

The median latest income was about £298,000. So the Foundation's sweet spot is the established local charity with paid staff, not the volunteer-run group and not the big national. Among the matched recipients, 193 were charitable companies and 150 were CIOs.

If your charity's income is under £25,000, this data says the odds were close to nil in the last core rounds. The National Lottery Awards for All guide and our guide to grants for small charities cover funders that back very small groups.

More Than Money: The Development Support

Funded partners can also get free development support, and the Foundation treats it as central to the grant. According to its what you can expect page (opens in a new tab):

• A Regional Manager meets your chief executive or a senior staff member for 60 to 90 minutes at least twice a year, first shortly after the grant is approved.
• Each charity has a ringfenced development budget, renewed every year of the grant.
• If a consultant is the right fit, they should hold a first meeting within four working weeks, and projects take 3 to 12 months.
• Support can include training, coaching, mentoring, IT equipment and help from Lloyds Banking Group staff.
• You complete a short monitoring report every year and discuss the support's impact at 18 months.

The page is clear that this takes time. Underestimate it and a small team can feel the strain, so budget senior staff hours for it, not just the money.

What Lloyds Bank Foundation Doesn't Tell You

Its published data is a year behind. The 360Giving records stop at September 2025, and the file on the 360Giving registry was last modified in June 2025. Its December 2025 programme, 29 grants of £75,000 over three years to local charities, most led by Deaf and Disabled people, for financial resilience work, isn't in the data yet. Don't read the 2025 dip as the Foundation shrinking: its funding page says it invested £22 million in grants in 2025.

A lot of 2026 money isn't open to applications. The £2 million in extensions went to existing partners, strategic grants are by invitation, and the £4 million Common Ground programme is delivered by Belong through local authorities. That's normal for a foundation mid-strategy, but it means "Lloyds Bank Foundation funding" in 2026 is mostly not something you can apply for.

Odds are about 1 in 12 to 1 in 15. The Foundation doesn't publish a success rate, but nearly 600 applications for 40 to 50 grants is the clearest number available. It also doesn't publish common reasons for rejection on its funding pages, so you can't rely on a checklist of mistakes to avoid.

Its priorities are now narrow by design. The strategy names five starting points: financial resilience, digital inclusion, preventing homelessness, non-profit housing and bridges across divides. A brilliant charity outside those themes may wait years for a fitting round.

It's a big funder. According to the Charity Commission register entry for the Foundation (charity 327114), its income for the year to December 31, 2025 was £29.6 million and its spending £30.2 million. Its December 2025 news post says Lloyds Banking Group has donated more than £800 million to its foundations over 40 years.

Who Shouldn't Wait for Lloyds Bank Foundation

Be honest about fit before you plan around this funder:

• Organisations outside England and Wales. It funds only there. Its news page says Lloyds Banking Group has four foundations; groups in Northern Ireland can look at the Halifax Foundation for Northern Ireland (opens in a new tab), groups in Scotland at the Bank of Scotland Foundation (opens in a new tab), and Channel Islands groups at the Lloyds Bank Foundation for the Channel Islands (opens in a new tab). Scottish charities can also use our funding for charities in Scotland guide.
• Very small groups. With 1 recipient in 402 under £25,000 income, apply elsewhere first.
• Anyone who needs money in the next six months. Even when a round opens, the New Beginnings timeline ran about five months from opening to final decision.
• Project-only bids outside its themes. Its recent core grants paid unrestricted money towards core costs, not one-off project budgets.

A common mistake is treating Lloyds Bank Foundation as a rolling programme you can apply to at any time. It isn't: it opens time-limited rounds with their own rules.

Good Alternatives While It's Closed

If you need funding before the next round:

Reaching Communities England is the closest match to what Lloyds Bank Foundation funds. The National Lottery Community Fund's page says most grants are under £500,000, and the average it gave in 2025 was £319,000 over three years. For CICs, our grants for community interest companies guide lists funders that accept them, and our community grants UK guide covers councils and community foundations.

Sources Checked

All sources were read or downloaded on October 29, 2026:

• Lloyds Bank Foundation for England and Wales: funding page (opens in a new tab), Good Place to Live: New Beginnings Fund (opens in a new tab), our strategy (opens in a new tab), how we choose where, how and who to invest in (opens in a new tab), what you can expect (opens in a new tab)
• Lloyds Bank Foundation news: why we're starting with homelessness prevention (opens in a new tab) (July 13, 2026), £4 million grant to strengthen community belonging (opens in a new tab) (October 16, 2026), working in partnership to end rough sleeping (opens in a new tab) (October 26, 2026), financial resilience grants (opens in a new tab) (December 9, 2025)
• 360Giving Datastore API, Lloyds Bank Foundation for England and Wales grants made (opens in a new tab), 7,713 grants (CC BY 4.0); the 360Giving registry (opens in a new tab) lists the Foundation's file "Grants awarded from 2010"
• Charity Commission for England and Wales, register entry for charity 327114 (opens in a new tab) and the register full data download (opens in a new tab), extract dated October 29, 2026
• Companies House, company 01971242 (opens in a new tab)
• postcodes.io (ONS postcode data) for recipient regions
• National Lottery Community Fund, Reaching Communities England (opens in a new tab)