Glossary
What is a grant-making trust?
A grant-making trust is a charity set up to give money to other organisations or individuals rather than to run services itself. Most are registered with a UK charity regulator, file annual accounts, and record in the register that they make grants to organisations.
Also called: charitable trust, foundation, trusts and foundations.
A grant-making trust is a charity whose purpose is to give money to other organisations, or sometimes to individuals, rather than to deliver services itself. The Charity Commission register records how each charity operates, and a trust's entry says it "makes grants to organisations". Funders in this group range from the Garfield Weston Foundation, which the register shows with income of £165 million, to thousands of family trusts with income under £100,000 and no website.
Why it matters when applying. Trusts are the largest group of UK grant funders by number and the hardest to find, because most publish neither open programmes nor their grants. Research starts with the register entry, which shows income, spending, what the charity does and who it helps, and continues with the accounts, which list the grants made. What is a grant-making trust and how do you approach one covers the approach; how to read a grant-making trust's accounts covers the reading.
Example. The Zochonis Charitable Trust, registered charity 274769, has no website. Its register entry on 26 October 2026 showed income of £2,283,820 for the year to 5 April 2025 and described its activity as "to support charitable causes by making grants". Everything else a fundraiser needs, including who it funded and whether it accepts unsolicited applications, is in the accounts attached to that entry. Its OpenGrant funder page shows the same register facts.
Frequently asked questions
- How many grant-making trusts are there in the UK?
- There is no official count, because the registers classify charities by what they do rather than by whether they are funders. OpenGrant lists every registered charity whose register entry says it makes grants to organisations, more than 49,000 of them, from large foundations with programmes and deadlines to small family trusts with no website.
- What is the difference between a trust and a foundation?
- In UK grant-making the words are interchangeable. Both describe a charity whose purpose is to fund others. The legal form behind the name varies: many are charitable trusts governed by a trust deed, others are charitable companies or charitable incorporated organisations. The name tells you nothing about size, openness or how to apply.
Read more
- Which UK trusts accept unsolicited applications, and how to tell
- How to read a grant-making trust's accounts and annual return
- How to use 360Giving data to find funders
- Trust fundraising prospect research: how to find out who funds charities like yours
- Funders A–Z
- Grants for charities and community groups