Scholarships for Mongolian students

Two questions dominate Mongolian scholarship discussion, and neither is really about grades. They translate roughly as "am I capable?" and "do I meet the requirements?" — so here are the requirements that actually decide things.

Do you need a university offer before applying to Chevening? No. Chevening takes your application first and asks for university offers at a later stage in the process. Applicants here regularly delay a Chevening submission while waiting on an admission decision, and lose the cycle for no reason. Chevening also asks for a networking essay, which is specific to it and worth preparing separately from the standard personal statement.

Does an English-taught bachelor's exempt you from a language test? Sometimes, and it is set by the receiving university rather than by the scholarship. A degree taught and assessed in English is commonly accepted in place of IELTS or TOEFL, but the institution decides, and each has its own list of qualifying countries and institutions. Chevening itself sets no English test. For applicants who have taken IELTS or TOEFL repeatedly without reaching the score they need, the practical move is to check whether the specific university will accept a medium-of-instruction route before booking another sitting.

Field restrictions bite here more than in most markets. Fulbright in Mongolia supports fields set by Government of Mongolia Resolution No. 115, which excludes some subjects outright — it is a bi-national programme, US-funded since 1995 with a Government of Mongolia co-funded track added in 2010, and the field list is a condition of that arrangement. Australia Awards is master's and doctoral only, within a priority sector list. Check the field list before the deadline, because no amount of academic strength overrides it.

Several tracks require you to already have an employer. The Government of Mongolia Scholarship requires an official secondment letter and proof of years of service. JDS, the Japan-ODA-funded programme, requires the employer's written permission and a fixed commitment to return to Mongolia. These are civil-servant routes in practice, and a private-sector or unemployed applicant will not clear them.

The genuinely open schemes are the ones with no such conditions. Erasmus Mundus has no nationality restriction at all and welcomes applicants worldwide. The ADB-Japan Scholarship Program names Mongolia among eligible citizenships and funds about 130 to 135 postgraduate awards a year. Stipendium Hungaricum and Türkiye Bursları both appear on Mongolia's own Ministry of Education bilateral-partner list with their own dated calls.

Mongolia has three application patterns and the money is distributed very unevenly across them.

Government-to-government allocations. These carry the largest numbers and run through Mongolia's Ministry of Education or the relevant embassy. China is the biggest by far: 220 Chinese Government Scholarship slots a year for Mongolian citizens in 2026/27, of which 138 were already enrolled continuing students and 82 were new places. Hungary and Turkey each run their own dated call through the Ministry — Türkiye Bursları's 2026-2027 registration ran from 10 January to 20 February 2026, extended to 25 February, with results in early August 2026.

Embassy tracks. These carry the smallest numbers and the sharpest competition. The Korean Embassy's 2026 GKS-U notice allocated Mongolia exactly two undergraduate seats. MEXT runs its embassy-recommendation route through the Japanese Embassy in Ulaanbaatar, as it does in any country with Japanese diplomatic representation. Australia Awards is embassy-coordinated and has sent more than 500 Mongolian graduates to Australian universities since the 1990s.

Direct application. Chevening takes applications on its own portal and has run in Mongolia since 1993, with more than 120 Mongolian alumni by the mid-2010s; the Ministry has separately run a joint Chevening and MECSS track. Fulbright supports up to 20 grantees a year for master's study. DAAD has funded Mongolians for decades — one 2015/16-era count recorded 67 Mongolians funded through DAAD alone, part of a combined 110 across DAAD, Fulbright and Chevening. Erasmus Mundus is applied for at each consortium directly.

For the state loan schemes, the sequence is different again and slower than applicants expect. Before anything academic is assessed, the Education Loan Fund needs a collateral agreement over real estate, an independent valuation report and property insurance in place. That is a property transaction running alongside a scholarship application, and it cannot be compressed.

Three document requirements here are unusual enough to plan around.

Real-estate collateral, valuation and insurance. Mongolia's own state routes — the President's Scholarship, the Government of Mongolia Scholarship and the Discounted Tuition Loan — are secured lending. They require a collateral agreement over property, a valuation report from an accepted valuer, and property insurance. This is the single biggest difference between Mongolia and every other market on this site, and it is why the foreign-funded schemes matter so much here.

Employer secondment and return commitment. The Government of Mongolia Scholarship requires an official secondment letter and proof of years of service. JDS requires written employer permission plus a fixed commitment to return to Mongolia after study. Both take time to obtain from an employer and neither can be produced at the last minute.

Apostille, with one exception to check. Mongolia has been a Hague Apostille Convention member since 31 December 2008, and an apostille from Mongolia's competent authority is valid without further legalisation in 117 member states. A short list of destinations still requires full consular legalisation instead, so confirm which applies to your destination before starting — the two processes are not interchangeable and one takes considerably longer.

For China specifically: the Chinese Embassy in Ulaanbaatar requires a completed Foreigner Physical Examination Form and a police-issued non-criminal-record certificate. Given that China provides 220 slots a year, this is the document set the largest number of Mongolian applicants will actually need.

On English: Chevening sets no English test of its own. Where a test is required it comes from the receiving university, and a bachelor's taught and assessed in English is often accepted in its place — but the institution decides, so check its policy before booking another test sitting.