---
title: "Gitcoin DeSci Grants"
url: "https://caper.network/wiki/desci/ecosystem/gitcoin-desci"
updated: 2026-08-18
license: CC-BY-4.0
license_url: "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"
---

# Gitcoin DeSci Grants

|  |  |
| --- | --- |
| **Type** | Funding Platform |
| **Focus** | Quadratic funding for public goods & DeSci |
| **Infrastructure** | Grants Stack, built on Allo Protocol |
| **Organization** | [Gitcoin DAO](/wiki/daos/public-goods/gitcoin-dao) |
| **First DeSci Round** | GR15 (2022) – $567k+ pool, 82 projects, 2,309 donors |
| **Latest Round** | GG24 – Oct 2025, first round of Gitcoin 3.0; still the most recent as of August 2026 |
| **GG24 Distributed** | Over $1.8M across six thematic domains – $1.175M Gitcoin matching, ~$632.5K partner matching, $36,657 in direct donations |
| **Website** | [gitcoin.co](https://www.gitcoin.co) |

## Overview

[Gitcoin](https://www.gitcoin.co) is the longest-running quadratic funding platform in the Ethereum ecosystem. Its Grants Round 15 (GR15) featured the [first-ever dedicated DeSci Round](https://web.archive.org/web/2023/https://www.gitcoin.co/blog/gr15-results), applying quadratic funding to open science: reimagining the incentives, culture, and infrastructure for research using Web3 tools.

Quadratic funding matches community donations using a formula that weights the _number_ of contributors above the _size_ of each contribution, so a project backed by many small donors receives proportionally more matching than one backed by a few large ones. This democratizes [science funding](/wiki/desci/desci-funding) in ways a traditional grant committee cannot – and it is why the mechanism depends heavily on [sybil resistance](/wiki/dao-governance/concepts/membership/sybil-resistance-in-daos): without a way to tell real donors from sockpuppets, the many-small-donors signal can be gamed.

## How the funding works: Allo Protocol & Grants Stack

Gitcoin's funding runs on [Allo Protocol](https://gitcoin.co/apps/allo-protocol), an open, modular allocation standard, surfaced to grant operators through [Grants Stack](https://gitcoin.co/apps/gitcoin-grants-stack) – the open-source platform that ran the Gitcoin Grants Program from 2023 through May 2025 and powered dozens of ecosystem partner rounds. Allo decouples _who is eligible_, _how funds are allocated_, and _how they are distributed_, so a round can swap in [quadratic funding](https://gitcoin.co/mechanisms/quadratic-funding), direct grants, or retroactive funding without rebuilding the plumbing.

[GG24](https://gitcoin.co/case-studies/gg24-first-funding-round-of-gitcoin-3-0) (donation phase 14–28 October 2025) – billed as the first funding round of "Gitcoin 3.0" – leaned into that modularity, running **six allocation mechanisms in parallel**: quadratic funding, deep funding, MACI private voting, [conviction voting](/wiki/dao-governance/concepts/voting/proposal-lifecycle), retroactive funding, and peer-reviewed [hypercerts](/wiki/dao-governance/concepts/treasury/hypercerts). It is the most mechanistically diverse Gitcoin round to date, and a useful live catalogue of the funding designs the broader [DAO treasury](/wiki/dao-governance/concepts/treasury/dao-treasury-management) world is experimenting with.

## DeSci Round Results & Trajectory

The GR15 DeSci Round saw [2,309 donors crowdfund $67.9k across 82+ projects](https://web.archive.org/web/2023/https://www.gitcoin.co/blog/gr15-results); with matching partners the total pool exceeded $567k. Funded work built new incentives for open practice, out-of-university validation, and shared research infrastructure – an early proof that community-driven science funding was viable.

DeSci was not carved out as a standalone domain in GG24, but the model GR15 established now shows up across the ecosystem: dedicated DeSci rounds on other platforms and the [one-donor-one-signal](/wiki/dao-governance/concepts/voting/token-weighted-voting) logic that [biotech DAO launchpads](/wiki/desci/ecosystem/molecule) borrow when they open community allocation. GG24 itself distributed [over $1.8 million across six thematic domains](https://gitcoin.co/case-studies/gg24-first-funding-round-of-gitcoin-3-0) – $1.175M of Gitcoin matching, roughly $632,500 from partner matching pools, and $36,657 in direct donations – with 78 open-source projects supported by about 1,300 unique donors in the two quadratic-funding rounds run on [Giveth](/wiki/daos/public-goods/giveth).

## Where the programme stands in 2026

Anyone budgeting around a Gitcoin round should read the cadence rather than the archive. Gitcoin ran grants rounds roughly [quarterly from GR1 in February 2019 onward](https://support.gitcoin.co/gitcoin-knowledge-base/gitcoin-grants/general-questions/when-is-the-next-grants-round). GG24, in October 2025, is still the most recent round: as of August 2026 no GG25 has run.

The reasons are on the record in Gitcoin's own forum. GG25 was opened for discussion by founder Kevin Owocki on 25 November 2025 under [two stated constraints – "keep burn low" and "rebuild relevance and upside"](https://gov.gitcoin.co/t/early-thinking-on-gg25/24883) – proposing coalition-funded rounds in one or two frontier domains rather than a broad seasonal round. That thread's last reply is dated 31 March 2026. A companion proposal to fund GG25 matching from [Octant's yield](https://gov.gitcoin.co/t/passed-gitcoin-x-octant-yield-powered-matching-pilot/25065) was withdrawn in December 2025 and re-passed in February 2026 as a pilot, decoupled from any specific round number.

The organization behind the rounds shrank to match. Gitcoin dissolved its Grants Lab business unit mid-2025 and moved into what it calls the Gitcoin 3.0 era; its [2026 DAO budget request of $1,053,469](https://gov.gitcoin.co/t/passed-gitcoin-dao-2026-budget-request/25075) describes a DAO that "deliberately hit the brakes in 2025 – spun down burn, shed organizational debt, and returned to a founder-stewarded, lean network." In August 2026 the DAO went further and put a [second budget tranche](https://gov.gitcoin.co/t/proposal-gitcoin-dao-2026-budget-request-second-tranche-revised-and-expanded/25353) to the forum that redirects roughly $1M toward a "local-first platform" for AI-displaced professionals – funding what matters _with_ Ethereum rather than _for_ it. For DeSci projects, the practical read is that Gitcoin's matching pool is no longer a dependable seasonal line item, and the mechanism has outlived the cadence: quadratic funding now runs on [Giveth](/wiki/daos/public-goods/giveth), partner rounds, and forked [Allo](https://gitcoin.co/apps/allo-protocol) deployments as much as on Gitcoin's own calendar. The organizational detail lives on the [Gitcoin DAO](/wiki/daos/public-goods/gitcoin-dao) page.

## How Caper approaches this

Quadratic funding answers "how do you fund good work when a committee can't scale?" by matching against the _breadth_ of small donors. [Caper](/wiki/foundations/what-is-a-caper) answers the same question differently: instead of a periodic matching round, each caper raises continuously from its [bonding curve](/wiki/markets/bonding-curve), and its treasury deploys that capital through [INVEST and PAYOUT proposals](/wiki/governance/proposals) that holders decide by [participation-weighted voting](/wiki/governance/voting). The shared instinct is the same – put allocation in the hands of the many who show up rather than a gatekept panel – but Caper trades the sybil-resistance overhead of a matching round for stake that has to be bought and held on the curve. It also removes the cadence risk visible above: a caper's treasury is always open to contribution, so a research group is never waiting on somebody else's round to be scheduled.

## External Links

- [Gitcoin – Official Website](https://www.gitcoin.co)
- [Gitcoin Grants 24 (GG24)](https://gitcoin.co/campaigns/gitcoin-grants-24-gg24) (the round explorer at `grants.gitcoin.co` stopped resolving in 2026)
- [GG24: The First Funding Round of Gitcoin 3.0 – Case Study](https://gitcoin.co/case-studies/gg24-first-funding-round-of-gitcoin-3-0)
- [Allo Protocol](https://gitcoin.co/apps/allo-protocol) · [Grants Stack](https://gitcoin.co/apps/gitcoin-grants-stack)
- [GR15 Results & Recap – Gitcoin Blog](https://web.archive.org/web/2023/https://www.gitcoin.co/blog/gr15-results)
- [Early thinking on GG25](https://gov.gitcoin.co/t/early-thinking-on-gg25/24883) – Gitcoin governance forum, November 2025.
- [Gitcoin DAO 2026 Budget Request (passed)](https://gov.gitcoin.co/t/passed-gitcoin-dao-2026-budget-request/25075) – the post-Grants-Lab operating model.