We list 6 fully Funded PhD Scholarships for Nigerian Students in the United Arab Emirates, with the deadline, study level and eligibility of each one taken from the award's own terms. 3 state eligibility that includes Nigerian applicants. Awards with a known closing date are listed soonest first.
Written from the 6 awards on this page — every figure below is counted from what the awards themselves state. 5 min read.
This page collects 6 fully funded PhD scholarships in the United Arab Emirates that are open to Nigerian students. Every award listed here is labelled fully funded by the provider, so the funding question is settled before you start reading individual entries. What varies is the subject, the university, the documents demanded, and the date the application closes.
The awards come from six providers: Khalifa University, Muhammad Bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence (MBZUAI) in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates University (UAEU), American University of Sharjah, the Sheikh Saud bin Saqr Al Qasimi Foundation for Policy Research, and Muhammad Bin Zaid University. Each appears once on the list.
Of the 6 awards, 3 are open to Nigerian applicants. That group breaks down in a way worth reading carefully: none of the 3 names Nigeria or the region in its eligibility text, and all 3 carry no nationality restriction. In other words, you qualify because the award does not exclude you, not because a clause was written for West African applicants. For the remaining 3, the eligibility position is not stated on the award itself, so you will need to check the provider's own page before you spend money on a courier.
This matters for how you read a call. An award with no nationality restriction is genuinely open, but it is also open to everyone else, and the competition reflects that. Read the entry, then read the provider's page, then decide whether the application is worth the transcript fee.
These are the benefits named in the awards' own text. They are what the provider has written, not a promise about your particular offer letter.
Tuition being covered is the norm on this list; a stipend for living costs is not. If you are supporting yourself or sending money home, check the living-costs line on the specific entry before you build a budget around it. Travel being named by only 2 awards is also worth noting — a flight from Lagos or Abuja to the UAE is a real cost, and on most of these awards it is not mentioned.
The requirements below are the ones the awards state in writing. They are the documents you will be assembling, paying for, and chasing.
Four out of six asking for an English test is the single most predictable cost on this page. Book early; test slots fill and results take time to reach you. The same four asking for recommendation letters means you should approach your M.Sc supervisors now rather than in the week the portal closes. Three awards state a minimum degree class, so read the wording on the entry and match it against your own classification before you apply. Three ask for a research proposal, which is the document that takes longest to write well.
The subject spread is narrow. Three fields are represented, each by one award: Computer Science & IT, Engineering, and Natural Sciences. If your research sits outside those three areas, this particular list is unlikely to serve you, and you should look at the wider PhD collection instead.
For Nigerian applicants holding an M.Sc, M.A, MBA or M.Phil, the pathway into these awards is a doctoral place. Funded doctoral positions and research scholarships in the UAE are frequently tied to a supervisor or a research group, which means the programme application and the scholarship application often share a single deadline. You are not applying for money separately from a place; you are applying for both at once, and a supervisor who wants you is a large part of the decision.
Of the 6 awards, 3 carry a stated date and 3 are still open. Three are undated and three recur, so the list is not a single-season snapshot — some of these calls come round again.
The busiest months are April, with 2 deadlines, and March, with 1. The three closing soonest are:
Two of the three fall in April, which means if you are working towards this cycle, March and early April are your writing months. The other three awards on the page are undated or vary by programme, so treat their entries as a prompt to check the provider's own timeline rather than a fixed target.
Note that several of these awards also cover master's study, and one covers undergraduate and postdoctoral level as well. The list is filtered to PhD, but the underlying awards are broader than the filter, so a master's route into the same university is often available through the same entry.
Start with the three dated awards, because they are the ones you can plan around. Open each entry, read the eligibility wording, and confirm for yourself whether a Nigerian applicant with your degree classification and your subject is eligible. For the three awards where eligibility is not stated, do not assume either way — check the provider's page before you commit to anything.
Then work backwards from the deadline. A research proposal takes weeks, not days. Recommendation letters depend on other people's time, and your M.Sc supervisor may be travelling or may want a draft from you first. An English test needs a booked slot and a result that reaches you in time. Transcripts from a Nigerian university and any courier costs sit on top of that, and those are costs you carry whether or not the application succeeds.
If your field is not Computer Science & IT, Engineering or Natural Sciences, this page is not the right starting point. Browse the wider fully funded PhD collection for other countries, and come back to the UAE list if a supervisor or a research group here matches your work.
Looking for a fully funded opportunity to study in the Middle East’s most dynamic academic hub? The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has emerged as a top destination for Nigerian students, thanks to its world-class universities, cutting-edge research facilities, and generous scholarship programs.
For the academic year 2025-2026, several fully funded scholarships in UAE are available to outstanding international students pursuing bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees. These scholarships typically cover tuition fees, monthly stipends, free accommodation, visa support, health insurance, and in some cases, travel expenses.
The UAE is home to prestigious universities such as United Arab Emirates University (UAEU), Khalifa University, Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence (MBZUAI), and American University of Sharjah, all of which offer generous funding for exceptional students.
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