Horizon Europe Strategic Plan 2025–2027: Priorities for a Green, Digital, and Resilient Future

The European Commission has published its second strategic plan for Horizon Europe, providing a detailed roadmap that outlines the core priorities and policy directions for EU research and innovation (R&I) funding for the programme’s final phase, which spans from 2025 to 2027. This updated strategy is not only a continuation of Horizon Europe’s long-term vision but also an ambitious recalibration aimed at positioning Europe as a global leader in addressing key societal and technological transformations. The plan underscores the EU’s commitment to using research and innovation as fundamental tools in navigating complex, interconnected global challenges. It establishes the foundation for accelerating Europe’s transition towards a more sustainable, digitally empowered, and socio-economically resilient future.

Three Strategic Orientations for 2025–2027

The new strategy revolves around three core strategic orientations, each designed to reflect Europe's evolving priorities and policy ambitions:

• Green transition: Advancing climate neutrality, environmental sustainability, and ecological restoration through transformative innovation in energy, mobility, industry, and agriculture.
• Digital transformation: Enhancing Europe’s leadership in cutting-edge digital technologies, including artificial intelligence, data infrastructure, quantum computing, and secure connectivity.
• A more resilient, competitive, inclusive, and democratic Europe: Strengthening the EU’s capacity to respond to societal shocks, foster inclusive growth, and reinforce democratic values through inclusive innovation and robust institutional frameworks.

These strategic orientations are crafted to ensure that Horizon Europe not only supports excellent science and technological leadership but also responds effectively to mounting global pressures. These include the climate crisis, accelerating biodiversity loss, rapid digital disruption, growing geopolitical tensions, and demographic shifts such as ageing populations. The plan also places a strong emphasis on fostering Europe’s open strategic autonomy and maintaining a competitive edge in the development and deployment of critical technologies. These cross-cutting principles will influence all research domains supported under Horizon Europe and ensure long-term coherence between policy and funding decisions.

Strengthening Commitments: Biodiversity, Climate, and Digital Investments

The plan raises Horizon Europe’s ambitions, especially in biodiversity. A minimum of 10% of the total Horizon Europe budget for 2025–2027 is earmarked for biodiversity-related topics. This builds on existing targets: 35% of Horizon Europe funds dedicated to climate-related activities, and €13 billion allocated to digital research and innovation during the same period.

Nine New European Partnerships

To advance its goals, the Commission proposes nine new co-funded and co-programmed partnerships:

1. Brain Health
2. Forests and Forestry for a Sustainable Future
3. Innovative Materials for the EU
4. Raw Materials for the Green and Digital Transition
5. Resilient Cultural Heritage
6. Social Transformation and Resilience
7. Solar Photovoltaics
8. Future Textiles
9. Virtual Worlds

These partnerships will support cutting-edge, cross-sectoral research and innovation aligned with strategic EU objectives.

A Spotlight on the New European Bauhaus (NEB)

For the first time, the strategic plan introduces the New European Bauhaus (NEB) Facility — a visionary movement that brings together citizens, local governments, businesses, universities, and institutions to reimagine sustainable and inclusive living in Europe and beyond.

The NEB will be implemented as a cross-cutting theme within Horizon Europe’s work programmes for 2025–2027. It will consist of an R&I component, supporting research-driven transformation, and an implementation component, enabled through synergies with other EU programmes.

Balancing Research and Innovation

The plan addresses the balance between early-stage research and market-oriented innovation. It commits to supporting a wide range of technology readiness levels (TRLs), and activities spanning from knowledge-generating basic research to demonstration and first deployment, such as in living labs, model regions, or lighthouse projects. Importantly, it pledges to strengthen low-TRL collaborative research projects under Pillar II of Horizon Europe.

Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH): Fully Integrated

The integration of social sciences and humanities is a key principle of the 2025–2027 strategy. SSH will play a vital role across all clusters, missions, and partnerships. This includes explicit SSH labeling in relevant topics, assessment of societal impact in proposal evaluation, and full involvement of SSH researchers from proposal design through to project execution.

What Comes Next?

These strategic orientations will shape the Horizon Europe work programmes, where actual funding opportunities are defined through specific calls for proposals.

The main work programme for 2025 is now being developed in line with the newly adopted strategy. In April 2024, the European Commission will open a public consultation, allowing stakeholders to provide feedback on the 2025 work programme.

Background

The strategic plan for 2025–2027 is based on a comprehensive internal analysis by European Commission departments, a gap analysis of missing topics and intervention areas, and extensive consultation with stakeholders, including Member States and associated countries, the European Parliament, and over 2,000 stakeholders and citizens. This made it the largest public consultation to date for an EU R&I framework programme.

This roadmap sets the tone for Horizon Europe’s final years — with a sharpened focus on impact, collaboration, and preparing Europe for the challenges of the coming decades.

The Work Programmes can be downloaded here: Horizon Europe Work Programmes - European Commission