Grants for young entrepreneurs in Italy: what’s open in 2026

Being under 35 opens some doors in Italy that quietly close later. A 26-year-old in Bari who is out of work can ask the state for a voucher of up to €40,000 to start a business. It’s a grant. Stick to the rules and nobody wants it back.

This guide sticks to the grants for young entrepreneurs in Italy that are open right now, in October 2026. You’ll see who can apply, what each programme pays, how to file and which small mistakes sink an application. One programme changed on 1 July, so part of what you’ll read elsewhere online is already out of date.

Which grants for young entrepreneurs in Italy are open right now?

Four national programmes matter if you’re under 35. All four are managed by Invitalia, the state agency for business development, and all four work “a sportello”: no deadline and no ranking. Applications are examined in the order they arrive, until the money runs out.

Programme	Who can apply	What you get	Status, October 2026	Where to apply
Resto al Sud 2.0	Ages 18 to 34, not in work, on the GOL programme or working poor; business in Abruzzo, Basilicata, Calabria, Campania, Molise, Puglia, Sardinia or Sicily	Voucher up to €40,000 (€50,000 with bonus) or grant of 75% up to €120,000, 70% up to €200,000	Open since 15 Oct 2025	Invitalia personal area
Autoimpiego Centro-Nord	Same age and status rules; business in the 12 central and northern regions	Voucher up to €30,000 (€40,000 with bonus) or grant of 65% up to €120,000, 60% up to €200,000	Open since 15 Oct 2025	Invitalia personal area
ON (Oltre Nuove imprese a tasso zero)	Micro and small firms up to 60 months old, more than half owned by people aged 18 to 35 or by women	Zero-interest loan over up to 10 years, within 90% of costs; plans up to €1.5M (€3M for older firms)	Open, loan only since 1 Jul 2026	Invitalia platform
Smart&Start Italia	Innovative startups up to 60 months old, or teams that will set one up	Zero-interest loan for 80% of a €100,000 to €1.5M plan (90% for all-women or under-36 teams); 30% non-repayable in the South	Open	Invitalia personal area

Two words before we go on. A grant, contributo a fondo perduto in Italian, is money you don’t repay. A zero-interest loan is different: you pay it back, only without the interest.

Resto al Sud 2.0: who can apply and how much you get

The original Resto al Sud has a successor, Resto al Sud 2.0, open since 15 October 2025. It was created by the 2024 “Decreto Coesione” (decree-law 60/2024) and has €356.4 million to spend, taken from the EU-funded national programme Giovani, donne e lavoro.

To qualify you need to be 18 to 34, so not yet 35, and in one of these situations: unemployed, inactive or without regular work, enrolled in the GOL employment programme, or working but earning very little (the “working poor”). The business has to be based in the South: Sicily, Sardinia, Calabria, Puglia, Campania, Basilicata, Molise or Abruzzo. Any sector will do, apart from agriculture, fishing and aquaculture.

Then you pick a route. Route one is a voucher of up to €40,000. It rises to €50,000 if, say, at least 20% of the spending goes on innovative, digital or green goods and services. Route two suits a bigger investment programme and pays a grant: 75% of the cost for programmes up to €120,000, 70% for those between €120,000 and €200,000. Support comes on top. Invitalia adds technical tutoring, and the Ente Nazionale per il Microcredito, the national microcredit agency, provides management mentoring.

Say Giulia is 27 and wants a small coffee roastery in Lecce, with €100,000 going on machines and works. Admitted on the grant route, she gets €75,000 from Resto al Sud 2.0. The remaining €25,000 she has to find herself, whether from savings, family or a bank.

Autoimpiego Centro-Nord: the same idea for the rest of Italy

Live in Lombardy, Veneto, Emilia-Romagna, Tuscany, Lazio, Piedmont, Liguria, Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Trentino-Alto Adige, Aosta Valley, Umbria or Marche? Your programme is the twin, Autoimpiego Centro-Nord. Same age range, same status rules, same opening day, a €219.6 million budget. The amounts are a little smaller.

Here the voucher covers 100% of the spending up to €30,000, or up to €40,000 if at least 20% of it goes on innovative, digital or green goods and services. The grant route pays 65% of programmes up to €120,000 and 60% from €120,000 to €200,000. Move Giulia’s roastery to Bergamo and her grant would be €65,000 instead of €75,000.

Both programmes accept nearly every legal form: sole trader, freelancer, partnership, SRL (the Italian limited company), cooperative. Two rules catch people out. The business must be started in the month you apply or the month before, and only expenses dated after the application count. The implementing decree also allows a single application per business, so it’s the voucher or the grant, not both.

ON and Smart&Start: when the plan is bigger

ON, short for Oltre Nuove imprese a tasso zero, is aimed at micro and small companies set up no more than 60 months ago in which more than half of the partners, and of the shares, belong to people aged 18 to 35 or to women. It finances plans of up to €1.5 million, or €3 million for companies older than three years.

This is the change many websites haven’t caught up with. A notice dated 30 June 2026, posted on the ministry’s ON page, says the money for the grant share has run out. From 1 July 2026 an application gets the zero-interest loan and nothing else. You repay it over up to ten years, and it still can’t exceed 90% of eligible costs.

Smart&Start Italia asks for something more specific: an innovative startup, a young company with real technology or research content, registered in a special section of the business register. It lends 80% of a plan worth €100,000 to €1.5 million, at zero interest and without guarantees. The share rises to 90% if the team is entirely made up of women and/or people under 36, and in the South 30% of the loan becomes a grant. Invitalia’s counter shows 1,444 startups financed, with data to 31 August 2026.

The rules are in our Smart&Start Italia guide, including a July 2026 decree that will only apply once its implementing circular is published. If you’d rather borrow from a bank, the SME guarantee fund can stand behind the loan, and once you’re buying machinery as an established company, look at the Nuova Sabatini. The big European programme, the EIC Accelerator, comes much later, when there’s deep technology ready to scale.

How do you apply for these grants, step by step?

1. Check that you fit. Age on the day the business starts, work status, region, sector. For Smart&Start, check the innovative startup requirements before anything else.
2. Get the digital kit. You log in to Invitalia with SPID, CIE or CNS and sign with a digital signature. Smart&Start also asks for a PEC, the certified email Italian offices use.
3. Write the plan with numbers. Say what you sell, who buys it and at what price, then where the money goes and why. Every machine, licence and service needs a written quote behind it.
4. Open the business at the right moment. For the two Decreto Coesione programmes that means in the month you file or the month before, not a year earlier.
5. File online and wait. Resto al Sud 2.0 and Autoimpiego Centro-Nord examine applications within 90 days. Smart&Start evaluates within 60 days and includes an interview.
6. Don’t spend before filing. Invoices dated before the application can’t be counted, however sensible the purchase was.

The rules themselves show where an application tends to break. A VAT number opened too early. A plan whose revenue line is a hope rather than an estimate. Purchases the programme doesn’t pay for. A team whose one essential skill sits with an outside consultant. None of these needs an expert to fix, only time before you press send.

Your checklist before you file

• Your age and work status on the day the business will start, written down
• The programme that matches your region and plan size
• SPID or CIE, a digital signature and a PEC address
• A business plan with prices, volumes and costs month by month
• Quotes for every purchase, with orders and invoices only after the day you apply
• A clear answer to how you’ll fund the part the grant doesn’t cover
• A note in your calendar to check the Invitalia page the week you file, since funds can run out

Not sure you need public money yet? The previous step on our map from zero to a first round shows how to start a startup with no money. The next one is to build an MVP without coding, so your application rests on something real people have tried.

This article is general information, not legal or tax advice. Rules and available funds change: check the official Invitalia page or ask a professional before you apply.